


Reading the House of Hades

by Mythology_geek02



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types
Genre: Mortal OCs
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-14
Updated: 2019-07-09
Packaged: 2019-08-23 09:27:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 32
Words: 70,305
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16616333
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mythology_geek02/pseuds/Mythology_geek02
Summary: Goode High School reads The House of Hades with Percy and his friends and the gods and goddess'. What will be revealed, Are Percy and Annabeth more traumatized then they thought? This will have slow updates and is cross posted on Fanfiction.net.





	1. The House of Hades

~Percy's POV~  
I had just walked through the doors of Goods high school ready for my first day back at school after the Giant war and the 8 months that I was 'asleep', or something. I had missed most of the school year and I am pretty sure that my mortal friends will have a lot of questions. Annabeth helped me come up with a perfect cover story that was the truth yet not so. Hopefully, no one will be suspicious. My brilliant plan was in motion and I was using my training from camp to sneak up on them while they were all eating lunch in the cafeteria. I tapped my friend Jack on the shoulder and when he looked up, I jumped to his other side and then yelled "BOO!" They all screamed and another of my friends, Lucy, dropped her sandwich. I started laughing and that's when they registered who was in front of them. They all gave me a giant hug that together could rival Tyson's death hugs.  
When they finally let me go they bombard me with questions. I didn't have time to answer any of them because announcements came on. Though, I wasn't actually listening because I was too busy trying to answer my friends questions. What caught my attention was when he said, "We need everyone in the gym for a talk with the Olympian Gods!" I instantly paled.   
"Did I just hear him say something about Olympian Gods?” I ask Lucy quickly.  
“Yeah, did you not hear, they revealed themselves last week!" Lucy answers.  
“Oh gods,” I thought, “I hope they aren't going to do what I think they are going to do.”  
As we headed towards the gym my friends explained what happened. When we got gym I saw the Olympians in the front of the room on a stage, sitting in their thrones. As soon as I entered they were all staring at me and that only confirmed my earlier suspicions about their reason for being here.   
Once everyone was seated, Zeus stood up from his throne and began to speak: "You already know us and if you don't then let me introduce us. We are the Olympians and Hades and Hestia are here as well."  
When he had finished speaking everyone stood up and bowed to the Olympians. Well, everybody except me, of course. Serena, one of my closest friends, looked at me and whispered urgently, “Percy, you need to bow or they’ll incinerate you or something!” I just frowned and waited for Drama King to continue. Zeus sighed and continued his speech, "Today, we are here to share the story of our children. They are halfbloods, or more commonly known as demigods. To be specific we are here to tell the story of the greatest hero."  
“Ugh, I knew it.” I thought.  
"Hercules?" My history teacher, Mr. Lee asked.  
"No, the hero I am speaking of is actually in this room." Everyone started whispering about where he could be when Zeus spoke again. "Perseus Jackson," he thundered. Sighing, I stood up and started making my way over to the front of the room.   
"Jeez Drama King, how many times do I have to remind you that it's Percy!" I could feel everyone staring at me. Probably wondering how I could talk to the King of the Gods so casually, and not get incinerated. As I hopped up onto the stage, I went over and gave my dad a quick hug. I stood next to him as Drama King continued.  
"Perceus, could you introduce yourself again, but give your full title?"   
“But it's so long! Do I have too?" I complained. My dad silenced me with a glare, and once again he warned me not to make Zeus mad. "Fine," I muttered.   
"My name is Perceus Achilles Jackson, Son of Poseidon, two time savior of Olympus, Finder of Zeus' master bolt, defeater of Ares at age twelve, very minimal experience, three time defeater of the Minotaur, Finder of the Golden Fleece, survivor of Circe's island. Oh and I also held up the sky, gained the respect of Artemis, slayed the Nemion lion, survived the labyrinth, defeated Kronos, became one of the seven, defeated Polybotes, Ephialtes, and Otis, and survived Tartarus." I said casually and then add, “I still missed a lot but, oh well.”  
Zeus sighed and snapped his fingers. A book appeared in his hand. "We will be reading a book about part of a quest he and the rest of the seven were on for the last few months."   
I paled instantly at the thought of that place. "But first let's call the rest of the seven and some other demigods," Zeus said, snapping his fingers once again. The rest of The Seven plus Nico, Thalia and Reyna appeared. When they saw me, they all headed over to join me, their faces inquiring.   
"Demigods, will you please introduce yourself and give your full title?" A chorus of “yes” answered him. One by one, they went up to introduce themselves. (a/n I am too lazy to write everyone's titles but you already know them anyway).  
Annabeth Chase  
Piper McLean  
Jason Grace  
Frank Zhang  
Hazel Levesque  
Leo Valdez  
Thalia Grace  
Reyna Avila Ramirez Arellano  
Nico Di' Angelo  
Once they were done introducing themselves Athena stood up and spoke, "I am Athena and I will start reading the book, the book is called The House of Hades."   
When she said that I hugged Annabeth and she did the same to me. The gods made some couches (out of thin air) for us to sit on and we started to read.


	2. Hazel I

(a/n) Book will be in Bold.  
DURING THE THIRD ATTACK, Hazel almost ate a boulder. She was peering into the fog, wondering how it could be so difficult to fly across one stupid mountain range, when the ship's alarm bells sounded.  
Percy and Annabeth leaned. Of course, they were curious about what had happened to their friends while they were down ‘there.’  
"Hard to port!" Nico yelled from the foremast of the flying ship.  
"How is the ship flying?" A bewildered teacher questioned nobody in particular. The demigods simply ignored him and continued to listen.  
Back at the helm, Leo yanked the wheel. The Argo II veered left, it's aerial oats slashing through the clouds like rows of knives.  
Hazel made the mistake of looking over the rail. A dark spherical shape hurtled towards her. She thought: why is the moon coming at us?  
Reyna gave Hazel a look that implied: "Why would it be the moon?"  
Then she yelled and hit the deck. The huge rock passed so close overhead it blew her hair out of her face.  
CRACK!  
The foremast collapsed- sail, spars, and Nico all crashing to the deck. The boulder, roughly the size of a pickup truck, tumbled off into the fog like it had important business elsewhere.  
"Ouch." Someone commented.  
"Nico!" Hazel scrambled over to him as Leo brought the ship level.  
" I'm fine," Nico muttered, kicking folds of canvas off his legs.  
She helped him up, and they stumbled to the bow. Hazel peeked over more carefully this time. The clouds parted just long enough to reveal the top of the mountain below them: a spearhead of black rock jutting from mossy green slopes. Standing at the summits a mountain god - one of the minima montanum, Jason had called them. Or ourae, in Greek. Whatever you call them, they were nasty.  
Like the others they had faced, this one word a simple white tunic over skin as rough and dark as basalt. He was about twenty feet tall and extremely muscular, with a flowing white beard, scraggly hair, and a wild look in his eyes, like a crazy hermit. He bellowed something Hazel didn't understand, but it obviously wasn't welcoming. With his bare hands, he pried another chunk of rock from his mountain and began shaping it into a ball.  
The scene disappeared in the fog, but when mountain god bellowed again, other numina answered in the distance, their voices echoing through the valleys.  
"Stupid rock gods!" Leo yelled from the helm. " that's the third time I've had to replace that mast! You think they grow on trees? "

"Masts are from trees." Annabeth said.  
Nico frowned. "Masts are from trees."  
Everyone busted out laughing as Annabeth just blushed in embarrassment, ducking her head.  
"That's not the point!" Leo snatched up one of his controls, rigged from a Nintendo Wii stick, and spun it in a circle. A few feet away, a trap door opened in the deck. A Celestial bronze cannon rose. Hazel just had time to cover her ears before it discharged into the sky, spraying a dozen metal spheres that trailed green fire.  
"Leo! Will you PLEASE learn to tell people when you fire the cannon!?" Annabeth yelled to a cowering Leo, her eyes blazing with abrupt rage. "How many times do I have to tell you that?" Annabeth continued to yellow, while holding Leo by his shirt. Finally, Percy laid a hand on her shoulder and she calmed down, although she continued to stare at Leo with a murderous look in her eyes.  
The spheres grew spikes in midair, like helicopter blades, and hurtled away into the fog.  
A moment later, a series of explosions crackled across the mountains, followed by the outraged roses of mountain gods.  
"Ha!" Leo yelled.  
Unfortunately, Hazel guessed, judging from their last two encounters, Leo's New weapon had only annoyed the numina.  
Another boulder whistled through the air off to the starboard side.  
Nico yelled, "Get us out of here!"  
Leo muttered some unflattering comments about numina, but he turned the wheel. The engines hummed. Magical rigging lashed itself tight, and the ship tacked to port. The Argo II picked up speed, retreating northwest, as they'd been doing for the past two days.  
Hazel didn't relax until they were out of the mountains. The fog cleared. Below them, morning sunlight illuminated the Italian countryside  
"You were in Italy!" Paul shouted. Percy just shrugged and replied, "No, they were, or did you forget already?"  
\- rolling green hills and golden fields not too different from those in Northern California. Hazel could almost imagine she was sailing home to Camp Jupiter.  
Everyone who had ever visited to Camp Jupiter got a faraway look in their eyes, filled with longing for the beautiful, rolling green hills.  
The thought weighed in her chest. Camp Jupiter had only been her home for nine months, since Nico had brought her back from the Underworld. But she missed it more than her birthplace of New Orleans, and definitely more than Alaska, where she'd died back in 1942.   
“WHAT!” All the mortals yelled. “YOU DIED!” Hazel glared at everyone angrily. Her death was still a sore topic, and they were not helping whatsoever. “YES NOW SHUT UP AND LISTEN!” she shouted and everyone immediately shut their mouths.  
She missed her bunk in the Fifth Cohort barracks. She missed dinners in the mess hall, with wind spirits whisking platters through the air and legionnaires joking about the war games. She wanted to wander the streets of New Rome, holding hands with Frank Zhang. She wanted to experience just being a regular girl for once, with an actual sweet caring boyfriend.  
Frank looked at Hazel and blushed scarlet at just knowing that was what she thought.  
Most of all, she wanted to feel safe. She was tired of being scared and worried all the time.  
All the demigods looked down sadly because they all knew that no matter what they were never safe.  
She stood on the quarter deck as Nico picked mast splinters out of his arms and Leo punched buttons on the ship's console.  
"Well, that was sucktastic," Leo said. " should I wake the others? "  
Hazel was tempted to say yes, but the other crew members had taken the night shift and earned their rest. They were exhausted from defending the ship. Every few hours, it seemed, some Roman monster had decide the Argo II looked like a tasty treat.  
A few weeks ago, Hazel wouldn't have been able to believe that anyone could sleep through a numina attack, but now she imagined her friends were still snoring away below deck. Whenever she got a chance to crash, she slept like a coma patient.  
"They need rest," she said. " we'll have to figure it out another way in our own."  
“Hazel you should have woken us up!” Jason said. “I know but you were all exhausted, especially you Jason.” Hazel retorted angrily.  
"Huh." Leo scowled at his monitor. I'm his tattered work shirt and grease-splattered jeans, he looked like he's just lost a wrestling match with a locomotive.  
“Did I really look like that?” Leo asked Nico curiously. Nico responded with: “You almost always did, you don’t look much better now.” Leo just nodded understanding.  
Ever since their friends Percy and Annabeth had fallen into Tartarus, Leo had been working almost non-stop. He'd been acting angrier and even more driven then usual.  
Hazel worried about him. But part of her was relieved by the change. Whenever Leo smiled and joked, he looked too much like Sammy, his great - grandfather . . . Hazel's first boyfriend, back in 1942.  
Ugh, why did her life have to be so complicated?  
“I am still waiting for an answer to that question.” Hazel looked pointedly at the demigods. They just said, “It’s your fate. We can’t change it.”  
" Another way," Leo muttered. "Do you see one?"  
on his monitor glowed a map of Italy. The Apennine Mountains ran down the middle of the boot shaped country. A green dot for the Argo II blinked on the western side of the range, a few hundred miles north of Rome. Their path should have been simple. They needed to get to a place called Epirus in Greece and find an old temple called the House of Hades (or Pluto, as the Roman's called him; or as Hazel liked to think of him: the World's Worst Absent Father).  
Hades looked away before sighing and walking over to her and Nico. And then he gave them both a hug and an apology before turning around and going back to join the rest of the gods, leaving a shocked Hazel and Nico still standing there with their mouths wide open.  
To reach Epirus, all they had to do was go straight east - over the Apennine and across the Adriatic Sea. But it hadn't worked out that way. Each time they tried to cross the spine of Italy, the mountain gods attacked.  
For the past two days they'd skirted north, hoping to find a safe pass, with no luck. The numina mountain were sons of Gaea, Hazel's least favorite goddess. That made them very determined enemies. The Argo II couldn't fly high enough to avoid their attacks; and even with all its defences, the ship couldn't make it across the range without being smashed to pieces.  
"It's our fault, " Hazel said. "Nico's and mine. The numina can sense us. "  
She glared at her half brother. Since they'd rescued him from the giants, he'd started to regain his strength, but he was still painfully thin. His black shirt and jeans hung off his skeletal frame. Long hair framed his sunken eyes. His olive complexion had turned a sickly greenish white, like the color of tree sap.   
In human years, he was barely fourteen, just a year older than Hazel, but that didn't tell the whole story. Like Hazel, Nico do Angelo was a demigod from another era. He radiated a kind of energy - a melancholy that came from knowing he didn't belong in the modern world.   
“How messed up is your life?” Lucy asked curiously. Percy looked at her darkly and gave her the answer she most dreaded hearing about her best friend “worse than you could even comprehend, Lucy.”   
Hazel hadn't known him very long, but she understood, even shared, his sadness. The children of Hades (Pluto - whichever) rarely had happy lives. And judging from what Nico had told her the night before, their biggest challenge was yet to come when they reached the House of Hades - a challenge he'd implored her to keep secret from the others.  
“Nico! You knew about that the entire time and didn’t tell us!” Leo yelled angrily as he was the only one who was there for that besides Hazel.  
Nico gripped the hilt of his Stygian iron sword. "Earth spirits don't like children of the Underworld. That's true. We get under their skin - literally. But I think the numina could sense this ship anyway. We're carrying the Athena Parthenos. That thing is like a magical beacon. "   
Hazel shivered, thinking of the massive statue that took up most of the hold. They'd sacrificed so much saving it from the cavern under Rome; but they had no idea what to do with it. So far the only thing it seemed good for was alerting more monsters to their presence.   
Athena glared at Hazel.   
Leo trace his finger down the map of Italy. "So crossing the mountains is out. Thing is, they go a long way in either direction. "  
"We could go by sea, " Hazel suggested. "Sail around the southern tip of Italy. "  
"That's a long way, " Nico said. "Plus we don't have . . . "  
His voice cracked. "You know. . . our sea expert, Percy. "  
The name hung in the air like an impending storm.  
“HEY! Only I can use analogies with water related stuff.” Percy huffed indignantly.  
Percy Jackson, Son of Poseidon . . . probably the demigod Hazel admired most. He'd saved her life so many times on their quest to Alaska; but when he had needed Hazel's help in Rome, she'd failed him. She watched, powerless, as he and Annabeth had plunged into that pit.  
“Hazel you didn’t fail me, please don’t ever think for a second that you did.” Percy   
Hazel took a deep breath. Percy and Annabeth were still alive. She knew that in her heart. She could still help them if she could get to the House of Hades, if she could survive the challenge Nico had warned her about . . .   
"What about continuing north?" She asked.  
"there has to be a break in the mountains, or something."  
Leo fiddled with the bronze Archimedes superstar he'd installed on the console - his newest and most dangerous toy. Every time Hazel looked at the thing, her mouth went dry. She worried Leo would turn the wrong combination on the sphere and accidentally eject them all from the deck, or blow up the ship, or turn the Argo II into a giant toaster.  
“Come on Hazel, how little faith do you have in me!” Leo wailed dramatically while pretending to cry into his hands. All of the demigods just sighed, rolling their eyes.  
Fortunately, they got lucky. The sphere grew a camera lens and projected a 3-D image of the Apennines mountains above the console.  
"I dunno." Leo examined the hologram. " I don't see any good passes to the north. But I like that idea better than backtracking south. I am done with Rome. "  
No one argued with that. Rome had not been a good experience.  
"Whatever we do," Nico said, " we have to hurry. Every day that Annabeth and Percy are in Tartarus . . . "  
He didn't need to finish. They had to hope Percy and Annabeth could survive long enough to find the Tartarus side of the Doors of Death. Then assuming the Argo II could reach the House of Hades, they might be able to open the doors on the mortal side, save their friends, and deal the entrance, stopping Gaea's forces from being reincarnated in the mortal world over and over.  
Yes . . . Nothing could go wrong with that plan.   
The demigods all burst out laughing at just the thought.  
Nico scowled at the Italian countryside below them. "Maybe we should wake the others. This decision affects us all."  
" No, " Hazel said. "We can find a solution."  
She wasn't sure why she felt so strongly about it, but since leaving Rome, the crew started to lose its cohesion. They'd been learning to work as a team. Then bam . . . Their two most important members fell into Tartarus. Percy had been their backbone. He'd given them confidence as they sailed across the Atlantic and into the Mediterranean. As for Annabeth - she'd been the De facto leader of the quest. She'd recovered the Athena Parthenos single - handedly. She was the smartest of the seven, the one with the answers.  
If Hazel woke up the rest of the crew every time they had a problem, they'd just start arguing again, feeling more and more hopeless.  
She had to make Percy and Annabeth proud of her. She had to take the initiative. She couldn't believe her only role in this quest would be what Nico had warned her of - removing the obstacle waiting for them in the House of Hades. She pushed the thought aside.  
"We need some creative thinking," she said. "Another way to cross those mountains, or a way to hide ourselves from the numina."   
Nico sighed. "If I was on my own, I could shadow travel. But that won't work for an entire ship. And honestly, I'm not sure I have the strength to even transport myself anymore."  
“That's understandable, you did just get rescued from the giants.”  
"I could maybe rig some kind of camouflage," Leo said, "Like a smoke screen to hide us in the clouds." He didn't sound very enthusiastic.  
Hazel stared down at the rolling farmland, thinking about what lay beneath it - the realm of her father, lord of the Underworld. She'd only met Pluto once, and she hadn't even realized who he was. She certainly had never expected help from him - not when she was alive the first time, not during her time as a spirit in the Underworld, not since Nico had brought her back to the world of the living.   
Her dad's servant Thanatos, god of Death, had suggested that Pluto might be doing Hazel a favor by ignoring her. After all she wasn't supposed to be alive. If Pluto took notice of her, he might have to return her to the land of the dead.  
Which would mean calling on Pluto would be a very bad idea. And yet . . .  
Please, Dad, she found herself praying. I have to find a way to your temple in Greece - the House of Hades. If you're down there, show me what to do.  
At the edge of the horizon, a flicker of movement caught her eye - something small and beige racing across the fields at incredible speed, leaving a vapor trail like a plane's. Hazel couldn't believe it. She didn't dare hope, but it had to be . . . "Arion."  
“He cusses too much.” Percy muttered to Hazel who just laughed.  
"What?" Nico asked. Leo let out a happy whoop as the dust cloud got closer.  
"It's her horse, man! You missed that whole part. We haven't seen him since Kansas!"  
Hazel laughed - the first time she had laughed in days. It felt so good to see her old friend. About a mile to the north, the small beige dot circled a hill and stopped at the summit. He was difficult to make out, but when the horse reared and whinnied, the sound carried all the way to the Argo II. Hazel had no doubt - it was Arion.  
"We have to meet him," she said. "He's here to help." "Yeah, Okay." Leo scratched his head. "But, Uh, we talked about not landing the ship on the ground anymore, remember? You know, with Gaea wanting to destroy us and all."  
"Just get me close, and I'll use the rope ladder." Hazel's heart was pounding. "I think Arion wants to tell me something."   
“That's the end.” Athena announced. “Who would like to read next?” she asked the people watching her.


	3. Hazel II

“I can read next” Paul said nervously as he approached Athena. She just passed him the book and he began to read.

Frank blushed again and tried to hide his face in Hazel's shoulder in his embarrassment.  
As soon as she reached the ground, she ran to A room and there her arms around his neck. "I missed you!" She pressed her face into the horses warm flank, which smelled of sea salt and apples. "Where have you been?"  
Arion nickered. Hazel wished She could speak horse like Percy could,  
"No you don't, especially not if it is to speak to that horse. Half of the things he says are cuss words! He is the rudest horse I have ever met." Percy commented.  
but she got the general idea. Arion sounded impatient, as if saying No time for sentiment, girl! Come on!  
"You want me to go with you?" she guessed.  
Arion bobbed his head, trotting in place. His dark brown eyes gleaned with urgency.  
Hazel still couldn't believe he was actually here. He could run across any surface, even the sea; but she'd been afraid he wouldn't follow them into the Ancient Lands. The Mediterranean was too dangerous for demigods and their allies.  
"That is so cool! How can he do that?" A mortal asked curiously while Hazel just shook her head before responding " I don't actually know, I didn't ask because I was always too busy trying not to die. " "Oh" was all the mortal could say.  
He wouldn't have come unless Hazel was in dire need. And he seemed so agitated.... Anything that could make a fearless horse skittish should've terrified Hazel.  
Instead, she felt elated. She was so tired of being seasick and airsick. Aboard the Argo II, she felt about as useful as a box of ballast. She was glad to be back on could ground, even if it was Gaea's territory. She was ready to ride.  
"Aren't you always? " Annabeth retorted.  
"Hazel!" Nico called down from the ship. "What's going on?"  
"It's fine!" she crouched down and summoned a good nugget from the earth. She was getting better at controlling her power. The precious stones hardly ever popped up by accident anymore, and pulling gold from the ground was easy.  
All the mortals mouths dropped open at just the thought of that being easy.  
She fed Airon the nugget... His favorite snack. Then she smiled up at Leo and Nico, who were watching her from the top of the ladder a hundred feet above. "Arion wants to take me somewhere."  
The boys exchanged nervous looks.  
"Uh..." Leo pointed north. "Please tell me he's not taking you into that?"  
Hazel had been so focused on Airon, she hasn't noticed the disturbance. A mile away, on the crest of the next hill, the storm gathered over some old ruins-- maybe the remains of Roman temple or a fortress. A funnel cloud snakes it's way down toward the hill like an inky black finger.  
Hazel's mouth tastes like blood. She looked at Arion. "You want to go there?"  
"Where else but the danger could you possibly need to go to As a demigod? " Percy asked.  
Arion whinnied, as if to say, Uh, duh!  
Well... Hazel had asked for help. Was this her dad's answer?.  
She hoped so, but she sensed something besides Pluto at work in that storm... something dark, powerful, and not necessarily friendly.  
Still, this was her chance to help her friends -- to lead instead of follow.  
She tightened the straps of her imperial gold cavalry sword and climbed into Arion's back.  
"I'll be ok!" She called up to Nico and Leo. " Stay out and wait for me."  
"Wait for how long?" Nico asked. " what if you don't come back? "  
"That's the question you try to avoid asking because it will jinx it, Nico" Jason pointed out.  
"Don't worry, I will," she promised, hoping it was true. She spurred Arion, and they shot across the countryside, heading straight for the growing tornado.  
Paul closed the book. Then he asked the question we all were thinking about... "Who wants to read next?" Frank stood up and raised his hand " I will, Mr. Blofis" he said as he walked over to Paul and took the book before walking back over to his seat next to Hazel.

 

 

 


	4. Hazel III

Frank started reading with Hazel leaning her head on his shoulder.  
THE STORM SWALLOWED THE HILL in a swirling cone of black vapor.  
Arion charged straight into it.  
“Why would you run into the storm, isn’t that dangerous?” a teacher asked.  
“When are we not doing something dangerous?” Leo retorts causing the rest of the demigods to laugh.  
Hazel found herself at the summit, but it felt like a different dimension. The world lost its color. The walls of the storm encircled the hill in murky black. The sky churned gray. The crumbling ruins were bleached so white, they almost glowed. Even Arion had turned from caramel brown to a dark shade of ash.  
In the eye of the tempest, the air was still. Hazel’s skin tingled coolly, as if she’d been rubbed with alcohol. In front of her, an arched gateway led through mossy walls into some sort of enclosure.  
Hazel couldn’t see much through the gloom, but she felt a presence within, as if she were a chunk of iron close to a large magnet. Its pull was irresistible, dragging her forward.  
Yet she hesitated. She reined in Arion, and he clopped impatiently, the ground crackling under his hooves. Wherever he stepped, the grass, dirt, and stones turned white like frost. Hazel remembered the Hubbard Glacier in Alaska—how the surface had cracked under their feet. She remembered the floor of that horrible cavern in Rome crumbling to dust, plunging Percy and Annabeth into Tartarus.  
Percy and Annabeth started to shiver at the mention of Tartarus. Annabeth buried her head in Percy's shirt and started to cry. Percy hugging Annabeth closer to him and reassured her that they were out now and they were safe until she calmed down enough to keep listening. The other members of the seven looked over at them as if making sure they could continue. Percy nodded to Frank and he started reading again.  
She hoped this black-and-white hilltop wouldn’t dissolve under her, but she decided it was best to keep moving.  
“Let’s go, then, boy.” Her voice sounded muffled, as if she were speaking into a pillow.  
Arion trotted through the stone archway. Ruined walls bordered a square courtyard about the size of a tennis court. Three other gateways, one in the middle of each wall, led north, east, and west. In the center of the yard, two cobblestone paths intersected, making a cross. Mist hung in the air—hazy shreds of white that coiled and undulated as if they were alive.  
Not mist, Hazel realized. The Mist.  
“What’s the mist” Lucy asked. Athena stood up and began to explain the mist is the supernatural veil that obscured the world of myth from the sight of mortals. It could deceive humans, even demigods, into seeing monsters as harmless animals, or gods as regular people.  
All her life, she’d heard about the Mist—the supernatural veil that obscured the world of myth from the sight of mortals. It could deceive humans, even demigods, into seeing monsters as harmless animals, or gods as regular people.  
“Wow mom did you copy Hazel?” Annabeth asked while chuckling softly.  
Hazel had never thought of it as actual smoke, but as she watched it curling around Arion’s legs, floating through the broken arches of the ruined courtyard, the hairs stood up on her arms. Somehow she knew: this white stuff was pure magic.  
In the distance, a dog howled. Arion wasn’t usually scared of anything, but he reared, huffing nervously.  
“It’s okay.” Hazel stroked his neck. “We’re in this together. I’m going to get down, all right?”  
She slid off Arion’s back. Instantly he turned and ran.  
“Never thought I would hear about the mighty cursing Horse running away and abandoning you Hazel.” Percy commented  
“Arion, wai—”  
But he’d already disappeared the way he’d come.  
So much for being in this together.  
Another howl cut through the air—closer this time.  
Hazel stepped toward the center of the courtyard. The Mist clung to her like freezer fog.  
“Hello?” she called.  
“Hello,” a voice answered.  
“That's scary! Who is it?!” a mortal yelled   
The pale figure of a woman appeared at the northern gateway. No, wait…she stood at the eastern entrance. No, the western. Three smoky images of the same woman moved in unison toward the center of the ruins. Her form was blurred, made from Mist, and she was trailed by two smaller wisps of smoke, darting at her heels like animals. Some sort of pets?  
Was it that farting weasel again Hazel?” Leo asked curiously   
She reached the center of the courtyard and her three forms merged into one. She solidified into a young woman in a dark sleeveless gown. Her golden hair was gathered into a high-set ponytail, Ancient Greek style. Her dress was so silky, it seemed to ripple, as if the cloth were ink spilling off her shoulders. She looked no more than twenty, but Hazel knew that meant nothing.  
“Hazel Levesque,” said the woman.  
“Does everyone always know our name before we tell them” Jason asks Percy who is sitting next to him still cuddling with Annabeth.  
She was beautiful, but deathly pale. Once, back in New Orleans, Hazel had been forced to attend a wake for a dead classmate. She remembered the lifeless body of the young girl in the open casket. Her face had been made up prettily, as if she were resting, which Hazel had found terrifying.  
This woman reminded Hazel of that girl—except the woman’s eyes were open and completely black. When she tilted her head, she seemed to break into three different people again…misty after images blurring together, like a photograph of someone moving too fast to capture.  
“Creepy” someone from the audience said.  
“Who are you?” Hazel’s fingers twitched at the hilt of her sword. “I mean…which goddess?”  
Hazel was sure of that much. This woman radiated power. Everything around them—the swirling Mist, the monochromatic storm, the eerie glow of the ruins—was because of her presence.  
“Ah.” The woman nodded. “Let me give you some light.”  
She raised her hands. Suddenly she was holding two old-fashioned reed torches, guttering with fire. The Mist receded to the edges of the courtyard. At the woman’s sandaled feet, the two wispy animals took on solid form. One was a black Labrador retriever. The other was a long, gray, furry rodent with a white mask around its face. A weasel, maybe?  
“I knew it!” Leo exclaimed  
The woman smiled serenely.  
“I am Hecate,” she said. “Goddess of magic. We have much to discuss if you’re to live through tonight.”  
“That is not a terrifying cliffhanger to end an chapter” Frank comments while closing the book indicating that he is done reading “who wants to read next?”


	5. Hazel IV

I’ll read now Annabeth said as she took the book from Frank before walked back over to me and snuggling up in my chest to read.  
HAZEL WANTED TO RUN, but her feet seemed stuck to the white-glazed ground.  
On either side of the crossroads, two dark metal torch-stands erupted from the dirt like plant stalks. Hecate fixed her torches in them, then walked a slow circle around Hazel, regarding her as if they were partners in some eerie dance.  
The black dog and the weasel followed in her wake.  
“You are like your mother,” Hecate decided.  
“That's not a creepy thing to just blurt out” Leo commented sarcastically.  
Hazel’s throat constricted. “You knew her?”  
“Of course. Marie was a fortune-teller. She dealt in charms and curses and gris-gris. I am the goddess of magic.”  
“Wait your mom was a witch!” someone from the crowd yelled and I could since Hazel scooting closer to Frank uncomfortable with everyone staring at her. I glared at the crowd daring them to make another comment before laying my head down on Annabeth’s in a signal to start reading again.  
Those pure black eyes seemed to pull at Hazel, as if trying to extract her soul. During her first lifetime in New Orleans, Hazel had been tormented by the kids at St. Agnes School because of her mother. They called Marie Levesque a witch. The nuns muttered that Hazel’s mother was trading with the Devil.

If the nuns were scared of my mom, Hazel wondered, what would they make of this goddess?  
I glared at the crowd again even though I knew they all felt guilty now after hearing that.  
“Many fear me,” Hecate said, as if reading her thoughts. “But magic is neither good nor evil. It is a tool, like a knife. Is a knife evil? Only if the wielder is evil.”  
“My—my mother…” Hazel stammered. “She didn’t believe in magic. Not really. She was just faking it, for the money.”  
The weasel chittered and bared its teeth. Then it made a squeaking sound from its back end. Under other circumstances, a weasel passing gas might have been funny, but Hazel didn’t laugh. The rodent’s red eyes glared at her balefully, like tiny coals.  
“Man that is like the weirdest weasel I have ever met. Do you remember when it paid Hazel a visit on the Argo II. Man Coach Hedge was pissed at it andall it's rude comments” Leo laughed and we all joined him after recalling the incident.   
“Peace, Gale,” said Hecate. She gave Hazel an apologetic shrug. “Gale does not like hearing about nonbelievers and con artists. She herself was once a witch, you see.”  
“Your weasel was a witch?”  
“Have course she was” I muttered under my breath thinking about all the strange things that all happen to be true and real and want to kill me.  
“She’s a polecat, actually,” Hecate said. “But, yes—Gale was once a disagreeable human witch. She had terrible personal hygiene, plus extreme—ah, digestive issues.” Hecate waved her hand in front of her nose. “It gave my other followers a bad name.”

“Okay.” Hazel tried not to look at the weasel. She really didn’t want to know about the rodent’s intestinal problems.  
Everyone busted out laughing until Hecate popped in with a poof and glared at us for talking bad about her friend. She disappeared an another poof once we had all calmed down.  
“At any rate,” Hecate said, “I turned her into a polecat. She’s much better as a polecat.”  
Hazel swallowed. She looked at the black dog, which was affectionately nuzzling the goddess’s hand. “And your Labrador…?”  
“Oh, she’s Hecuba, the former queen of Troy,” Hecate said, as if that should be obvious.  
The dog grunted.  
“You’re right, Hecuba,” the goddess said. “We don’t have time for long introductions. The point is, Hazel Levesque, your mother may have claimed not to believe, but she had true magic. Eventually, she realized this. When she searched for a spell to summon the god Pluto, I helped her find it.”  
“You…?”  
“Yes.” Hecate continued circling Hazel. “I saw potential in your mother. I see even more potential in you.”  
Hazel’s head spun. She remembered her mother’s confession just before she had died: how she’d summoned Pluto, how the god had fallen in love with her, and how, because of her greedy wish, her daughter Hazel had been born with a curse. Hazel could summon riches from the earth, but anyone who used them would suffer and die.  
Everyone stared at Hazel like she had suddenly grown another head at hearing that she was cursed and could kill them all. “Don't worry everyone the curse is gone now” she said happily while leaning onto Frank who was blushing so bad I thought his heart might explode. I chuckled and stroked Wisegirls hair as she continued to read again.  
Now this goddess was saying that she had made all that happen.  
“My mother suffered because of that magic. My whole life—”  
“Your life wouldn’t have happened without me,” Hecate said flatly. “I have no time for your anger. Neither do you. Without my help, you will die.”  
The black dog snarled. The polecat snapped its teeth and passed gas.  
Hazel felt like her lungs were filling with hot sand.  
“Wow that was hard to take in” Frank commented  
“What kind of help?” she demanded.  
Hecate raised her pale arms. The three gateways she’d come from—north, east, and west—began to swirl with Mist. A flurry of black-and-white images glowed and flickered, like the old silent movies that were still playing in theaters sometimes when Hazel was small.  
In the western doorway, Roman and Greek demigods in full armor fought one another on a hillside under a large pine tree. The grass was strewn with the wounded and the dying. Hazel saw herself riding Arion, charging through the melee and shouting—trying to stop the violence.  
All the demigods cringed at the thought have that happening. All the mortals were confused one asked “Why would you fight each other? You guys are all like best friends?”  
Reyna spoke up to answer “Well at the time we weren’t. The gods had separated us almost one hundred years ago because everytime we met we fought. The last time we fought before this would have been during WWII and it was Greeks on one side and Romans on the other. Mortals just joined in on the massacure . Since then we all thought the other didn't exist anymore and did our own thing while the gods tried to avoid us making contact on our quests and stuff. We helped each other from the shadows unknowingly for years until now.”   
In the gateway to the east, Hazel saw the Argo II plunging through the sky above the Apennines. Its rigging was in flames. A boulder smashed into the quarterdeck. Another punched through the hull. The ship burst like a rotten pumpkin, and the engine exploded.  
“Ouch” someone in the audience commented.  
The images in the northern doorway were even worse. Hazel saw Leo, unconscious—or dead—falling through the clouds. She saw Frank staggering alone down a dark tunnel, clutching his arm, his shirt soaked in blood. And Hazel saw herself in a vast cavern filled with strands of light like a luminous web. She was struggling to break through while, in the distance, Percy and Annabeth lay sprawled and unmoving at the foot of two black-and-silver metal doors.  
“ Hey that's almost exactly what happened though. I was falling through the sky unconscious at one point until I landed on my girlfriends island and that's how we met. Frank did get an arrow to the arm he just wasn't alone. Percy and Annabeth were unconscious at the foot have the doors to before we helped them.” Leo yelled like he had just had the biggest revelation in the world.   
“Choices,” said Hecate. “You stand at the crossroads, Hazel Levesque. And I am the goddess of crossroads.”  
The ground rumbled at Hazel’s feet. She looked down and saw the glint of silver coins…thousands of old Roman denarii breaking the surface all around her, as if the entire hilltop was coming to a boil. She’d been so agitated by the visions in the doorways that she must have summoned every bit of silver in the surrounding countryside.  
“Oops” Hazel muttered under her breath.  
“The past is close to the surface in this place,” Hecate said. “In ancient times, two great Roman roads met here. News was exchanged. Markets were held. Friends met, and enemies fought. Entire armies had to choose a direction. Crossroads are always places of decision.”  
“Isn’t that like what Janus said when we met him in the Labyrinth a few years ago?” I asked Annabeth. “U... Yeah but I think he made it sound a lot more creepy and scary like whenever he would switch faces and start arguing with himself about which option was better.” She commented shivering about remembering the Labyrinth while I hugging her closer to me and kissed the top have her head to calm her down.  
“Like…like Janus.” Hazel remembered the shrine of Janus on Temple Hill back at Camp Jupiter. Demigods would go there to make decisions. They would flip a coin, heads or tails, and hope the two-faced god would guide them well. Hazel had always hated that place. She’d never understood why her friends were so willing to let a god take away their responsibility for choosing. After all Hazel had been through, she trusted the wisdom of the gods about as much as she trusted a New Orleans slot machine.

The goddess of magic made a disgusted hiss. “Janus and his doorways. He would have you believe that all choices are black or white, yes or no, in or out. In fact, it’s not that simple. Whenever you reach the crossroads, there are always at least three ways to go…four, if you count going backward. You are at such a crossing now, Hazel.”  
“Wow Hazel we were thinking the same thing” Percy said excitedly.  
Hazel looked again at each swirling gateway: a demigod war, the destruction of the Argo II, disaster for herself and her friends. “All the choices are bad.”  
“All choices have risks,” the goddess corrected. “But what is your goal?”  
“My goal?” Hazel waved helplessly at the doorways. “None of these.”  
The dog Hecuba snarled. Gale the polecat skittered around the goddess’s feet, farting and gnashing her teeth.  
“You could go backward,” Hecate suggested, “retrace your steps to Rome…but Gaea’s forces are expecting that. None of you will survive.”  
“So…what are you saying?”  
Hecate stepped to the nearest torch. She scooped a handful of fire and sculpted the flames until she was holding a miniature relief map of Italy.  
“You could go west.” Hecate let her finger drift away from her fiery map. “Go back to America with your prize, the Athena Parthenos. Your comrades back home, Greek and Roman, are on the brink of war. Leave now, and you might save many lives.”  
“Might usually means you won't in the demigod world” Jason sighed.  
“Might,” Hazel repeated. “But Gaea is supposed to wake in Greece. That’s where the giants are gathering.”

“True. Gaea has set the date of August first, the Feast of Spes, goddess of hope, for her rise to power. By waking on the Day of Hope, she intends to destroy all hope forever. Even if you reached Greece by then, could you stop her? I do not know.” Hecate traced her finger along the tops of the fiery Apennines. “You could go east, across the mountains, but Gaea will do anything to stop you from crossing Italy. She has raised her mountain gods against you.”  
“We noticed,” Hazel said.  
“Any attempt to cross the Apennines will mean the destruction of your ship. Ironically, this might be the safest option for your crew. I foresee that all of you would survive the explosion. It is possible, though unlikely, you could still reach Epirus and close the Doors of Death. You might find Gaea and prevent her rise. But by then, both demigod camps would be destroyed. You would have no home to return to.” Hecate smiled. “More likely, the destruction of your ship would strand you in the mountains. It would mean the end of your quest, but it would spare you and your friends much pain and suffering in the days to come. The war with the giants would have to be won or lost without you.”  
Won or lost without us.  
A small, guilty part of Hazel found that appealing. She’d been wishing for the chance to be a normal girl. She didn’t want any more pain or suffering for herself and her friends. They’d already been through so much.  
“We all feel that way Hazel. Especially those have us that have constant life threatening quests and prophecies that usually get your friends killed.” I said sadly thinking about all the people I couldn't save over the years since I found out I was a demigod. I hadn't noticed I had started crying until I could feel Annabeth wiping away our tears and trying to calm me down.  
She looked behind Hecate at the middle gateway. She saw Percy and Annabeth sprawled helplessly before those black-and-silver doors. A massive dark shape, vaguely humanoid, now loomed over them, its foot raised as if to crush Percy.  
“What about them?” Hazel asked, her voice ragged. “Percy and Annabeth?”  
Hecate shrugged. “West, east, or south…they die.”  
“Not an option,” Hazel said.  
“Of course that's not an option!” Nico said indignantly.  
“Then you have only one path, though it is the most dangerous.”  
“As usual” I muttered.  
Hecate’s finger crossed her miniature Apennines, leaving a glowing white line in the red flames. “There is a secret pass here in the north, a place where I hold sway, where Hannibal once crossed when he marched against Rome.”  
The goddess made a wide loop…to the top of Italy, then east to the sea, then down along the western coast of Greece. “Once through the pass, you would travel north to Bologna, and then to Venice. From there, sail the Adriatic to your goal, here: Epirus in Greece.”  
Hazel didn’t know much about geography. She had no idea what the Adriatic Sea was like. She’d never heard of Bologna, and all she knew about Venice was vague stories about canals and gondolas. But one thing was obvious. “That’s so far out of the way.”  
“Which is why Gaea will not expect you to take this route,” Hecate said. “I can obscure your progress somewhat, but the success of your journey will depend on you, Hazel Levesque. You must learn to use the Mist.”

“Me?” Hazel’s heart felt like it was tumbling down her rib cage. “Use the Mist how?”  
“So that's how you started to learn that” Leo said.  
Hecate extinguished her map of Italy. She flicked her hand at the black dog Hecuba. Mist collected around the Labrador until she was completely hidden in a cocoon of white. The fog cleared with an audible poof! Where the dog had stood was a disgruntled-looking black kitten with golden eyes.  
“Mew,” it complained.  
“I am the goddess of the Mist,” Hecate explained. “I am responsible for keeping the veil that separates the world of the gods from the world of mortals. My children learn to use the Mist to their advantage, to create illusions or influence the minds of mortals. Other demigods can do this as well. And so must you, Hazel, if you are to help your friends.”  
“But…” Hazel looked at the cat. She knew it was actually Hecuba, the black Labrador, but she couldn’t convince herself. The cat seemed so real. “I can’t do that.”  
“Your mother had the talent,” Hecate said. “You have even more. As a child of Pluto who has returned from the dead, you understand the veil between worlds better than most. You can control the Mist. If you do not…well, your brother Nico has already warned you. The spirits have whispered to him, told him of your future. When you reach the House of Hades, you will meet a formidable enemy. She cannot be overcome by strength or sword. You alone can defeat her, and you will require magic.”

Hazel’s legs felt wobbly. She remembered Nico’s grim expression, his fingers digging into her arm. You can’t tell the others. Not yet. Their courage is already stretched to the limit.  
“Who?” Hazel croaked. “Who is this enemy?”  
“I will not speak her name,” Hecate said. “That would alert her to your presence before you are ready to face her. Go north, Hazel. As you travel, practice summoning the Mist. When you arrive in Bologna, seek out the two dwarfs. They will lead you to a treasure that may help you survive in the House of Hades.”  
“Those Dwarfs were insane” Jason commented while Leo was just laughing remembering that experience.  
“I don’t understand.”  
“Mew,” the kitten complained.  
“Yes, yes, Hecuba.” The goddess flicked her hand again, and the cat disappeared. The black Labrador was back in its place.  
“You will understand, Hazel,” the goddess promised. “From time to time, I will send Gale to check on your progress.”  
The polecat hissed, its beady red eyes full of malice.  
“Wonderful,” Hazel muttered.  
“Before you reach Epirus, you must be prepared,” Hecate said. “If you succeed, then perhaps we will meet again…for the final battle.”  
A final battle, Hazel thought. Oh, joy.  
Hazel wondered if she could prevent the revelations she saw in the Mist—Leo falling through the sky; Frank stumbling through the dark, alone and gravely wounded; Percy and Annabeth at the mercy of a dark giant.  
“You did Hazel we are all ok and it was all thanks to you” Frank said proudly.  
She hated the gods’ riddles and their unclear advice. She was starting to despise crossroads.  
“Why are you helping me?” Hazel demanded. “At Camp Jupiter, they said you sided with the Titans in the last war.”  
Hecate’s dark eyes glinted. “Because I am a Titan—daughter of Perses and Asteria. Long before the Olympians came to power, I ruled the Mist. Despite this, in the First Titan War, millennia ago, I sided with Zeus against Kronos. I was not blind to Kronos’s cruelty. I hoped Zeus would prove a better king.”  
She gave a small, bitter laugh. “When Demeter lost her daughter Persephone, kidnapped by your father, I guided Demeter through the darkest night with my torches, helping her search. And when the giants rose the first time, I again sided with the gods. I fought my archenemy Clytius, made by Gaea to absorb and defeat all my magic.”  
“Clytius.” Hazel had never heard that name—Clai-tee-us—but saying it made her limbs feel heavy. She glanced at the images in the northern doorway—the massive dark shape looming over Percy and Annabeth. “Is he the threat in the House of Hades?”  
“That guy sure got a butt kicking it was so fun to watch” Hazel laughed while her friends smiled.   
“Oh, he waits for you there,” Hecate said. “But first you must defeat the witch. Unless you manage that…”

She snapped her fingers, and all of the gateways turned dark. The Mist dissolved, the images gone.  
“We all face choices,” the goddess said. “When Kronos arose the second time, I made a mistake. I supported him. I had grown tired of being ignored by the so-called major gods. Despite my years of faithful service, they mistrusted me, refused me a seat in their hall…”  
The polecat Gale chittered angrily.  
“It does not matter anymore.” The goddess sighed. “I have made peace again with Olympus. Even now, when they are laid low—their Greek and Roman personas fighting each other—I will help them. Greek or Roman, I have always been only Hecate. I will assist you against the giants, if you prove yourself worthy. So now it is your choice, Hazel Levesque. Will you trust me…or will you shun me, as the Olympian gods have done too often?”  
Blood roared in Hazel’s ears. Could she trust this dark goddess, who’d given her mother the magic that ruined her life? Sorry, no. She didn’t much like Hecate’s dog or her gassy polecat, either.  
But she also knew she couldn’t let Percy and Annabeth die.  
“I’ll go north,” she said. “We’ll take your secret pass through the mountains.”  
Hecate nodded, the slightest hint of satisfaction in her face. “You have chosen well, though the path will not be easy. Many monsters will rise against you. Even some of my own servants have sided with Gaea, hoping to destroy your mortal world.”  
“Kelli” Annabeth Hissed. “Who is Kelli” Piper asked curiously. “ Oh she is an empusa we met a few years ago at Percy’s freshman orientation to this school and we ether like 3 times now because she keeps reforming. We met her again in Tartarus we stopped her from trying to get revenge on us again in the real world by killing her down there.” Annabeth said darkly before she continued to read again.   
The goddess took her double torches from their stands. “Prepare yourself, daughter of Pluto. If you succeed against the witch, we will meet again.”  
“I’ll succeed,” Hazel promised. “And Hecate? I’m not choosing one of your paths. I’m making my own.”  
The goddess arched her eyebrows. Her polecat writhed, and her dog snarled.  
“We’re going to find a way to stop Gaea,” Hazel said. “We’re going to rescue our friends from Tartarus. We’re going keep the crew and the ship together, and we’re going to stop Camp Jupiter and Camp Half-Blood from going to war. We’re going to do it all.”  
“That's the spirit Hazel!” We all cheered.  
The storm howled, the black walls of the funnel cloud swirling faster.  
“Interesting,” Hecate said, as if Hazel were an unexpected result in a science experiment. “That would be magic worth seeing.”  
A wave of darkness blotted out the world. When Hazel’s sight returned, the storm, the goddess, and her minions were gone. Hazel stood on the hillside in the morning sunlight, alone in the ruins except for Arion, who paced next to her, nickering impatiently.  
“I agree,” Hazel told the horse. “Let’s get out of here.”  
“What happened?” Leo asked as Hazel climbed aboard the Argo II.

Hazel’s hands still shook from her talk with the goddess. She glanced over the rail and saw the dust of Arion’s wake stretching across the hills of Italy. She had hoped her friend would stay, but couldn’t blame him for wanting to get away from this place as fast as possible.  
The countryside sparkled as the summer sun hit the morning dew. On the hill, the old ruins stood white and silent—no sign of ancient paths, or goddesses, or farting weasels.  
“Hazel?” Nico asked.  
Her knees buckled. Nico and Leo grabbed her arms and helped her to the steps of the foredeck. She felt embarrassed, collapsing like some fairy-tale damsel, but her energy was gone. The memory of those glowing scenes at the crossroads filled her with dread.  
“I met Hecate,” she managed.  
She didn’t tell them everything. She remembered what Nico had said: Their courage is already stretched to the limit. But she told them about the secret northern pass through the mountains, and the detour Hecate described that could take them to Epirus.  
When she was done, Nico took her hand. His eyes were full of concern. “Hazel, you met Hecate at a crossroads. That’s…that’s something many demigods don’t survive. And the ones who do survive are never the same. Are you sure you’re—”  
“I’m fine,” she insisted.  
But she knew she wasn’t. She remembered how bold and angry she’d felt, telling the goddess she’d find her own path and succeed at everything. Now her boast seemed ridiculous. Her courage had abandoned her.

“What if Hecate is tricking us?” Leo asked. “This route could be a trap.”  
Hazel shook her head. “If it was a trap, I think Hecate would’ve made the northern route sound tempting. Believe me, she didn’t.”  
Leo pulled a calculator out of his tool belt and punched in some numbers. “That’s…something like three hundred miles out of our way to get to Venice. Then we’d have to backtrack down the Adriatic. And you said something about baloney dwarfs?”  
“Dwarfs in Bologna,” Hazel said. “I guess Bologna is a city. But why we have to find dwarfs there…I have no idea. Some sort of treasure to help us with the quest.  
“Huh,” Leo said. “I mean, I’m all about treasure, but—”  
“It’s our best option.” Nico helped Hazel to her feet. “We have to make up for lost time, travel as fast as we can. Percy’s and Annabeth’s lives might depend on it.”  
“Fast?” Leo grinned. “I can do fast.”  
He hurried to the console and started flipping switches.  
Nico took Hazel’s arm and guided her out of earshot. “What else did Hecate say? Anything about—”  
“I can’t.” Hazel cut him off. The images she’d seen had almost overwhelmed her: Percy and Annabeth helpless at the feet of those black metal doors, the dark giant looming over them, Hazel herself trapped in a glowing maze of light, unable to help.  
A mortal spoke up for the first time in a while scaring us because they were so quiet we forgot they were there. “Any have would be overwhelmed with that.”  
You must defeat the witch, Hecate had said. You alone can defeat her. Unless you manage that…  
The end, Hazel thought. All gateways closed. All hope extinguished.  
Nico had warned her. He’d communed with the dead, heard them whispering hints about their future. Two children of the Underworld would enter the House of Hades. They would face an impossible foe. Only one of them would make it to the Doors of Death.  
Hazel couldn’t meet her brother’s eyes.  
“I’ll tell you later,” she promised, trying to keep her voice from trembling. “Right now, we should rest while we can. Tonight, we cross the Apennines.”  
“Done Annabeth said closing the book. Who wants to read now it's going to be a different point to view.”


	6. Annabeth V

I guess I could read next my friend Jake said so we gave him the book.

NINE DAYS.

As she fell, Annabeth thought about Hesiod, the old Greek poet who'd speculated it would take nine days to fall from earth to Tartarus.

"Only Annabeth would be thinking about ancient poetry as we fall into the deepest part have the underworld and the homeland have everything that wants to kill us" I said while sighing at my overly smart girlfriend.

She hoped Hesiod was wrong. She'd lost track of how long she and Percy had been falling-hours? A day? It felt like an eternity. They'd been holding hands ever since they dropped into the chasm. Now Percy pulled her close, hugging her tight as they tumbled through absolute darkness.

"Um... Can someone recap what happened before this because I am really confused?" My friend Lucy asked.

I was surprised when Nico stood up "I'll do it I guess." He sighed. "Ok so we had been on our quest for a while and we're stopping to do a kind have detour quest and missions. We had a prophecy we we're following that said:

'Wisdom's daughter walks alone,

The Mark of Athena burns through Rome.

Twins snuff out the angel's breath,

Giants' bane stands gold and pale,

Won through pain and a woven jail.'

Annabeth went on a solo quest from her mother Athena to find the Athena Parthenos that the romans stole and hid thousands have years ago. Athena has sent lots have her kids on this quest to follow the Mark have Athena over the years but none have found or survived to tell about it. She ended in a chamber under Rome with the statue guarded by the spider Arachne. The room was so old that it was falling apart and was only being kept intact by Arachne's thread. Annabeth tricked Arachne into weaving her own jail just like the prophecy said.

I had been captured ages ago by the twin giants and had been trapped in a sealed bronze jar which explains the other line. My last name Di Angelo is italian for Angel so, yeah. Percy, Jason and Piper went on a quest to save me and kill the twin giants before they destroyed Rome. Leo, Hazel and Frank went to find some supplies for Leo since he figured out Archimedes secret and basically raided his old workshop and came back with cool new stuff. After all that we all met up with Coach Hedge who was Manning the ship or Goating it really and went to find Annabeth. We found he just as the room was going to collapse and we secured the giant 40 foot statue while Percy helped Annabeth. We we're about to get out when the floor gave way and the webbing that was on Annabeth's foot started to drag her to the giant pit that we had found led all the way to Tartarus. She fell and Percy grabbed her and fell in too but he grabbed a ledge so he could try to pull them out but it was useless. He told me to lead everyone else to Espirus the place we were headed to and he would meet us there after they had closed the doors have death from the Tartarus side. And then he let go have the ledge and they fell." He said before sitting down. We we're all just silently staring at him until Jake broke the silence by reading again.

Wind whistled in Annabeth's ears. The air grew hotter and damper, as if they were plummeting into the throat of a massive dragon. Her recently broken ankle throbbed, though she couldn't tell if it was still wrapped in spiderwebs.

That cursed monster Arachne. Despite having been trapped in her own webbing, smashed by a car, and plunged into Tartarus, the spider lady had gotten her revenge. Somehow her silk had entangled Annabeth's leg and dragged her over the side of the pit, with Percy in tow.

Annabeth couldn't imagine that Arachne was still alive, somewhere below them in the darkness. She didn't want to meet that monster again when they reached the bottom. On the bright side, assuming there was a bottom, Annabeth and Percy would probably be flattened on impact, so giant spiders were the least of their worries.

"Wow you guys are so optimistic" Jason said sarcastically while I retorted "Hey we we're falling to Tartarus! Would you have been anymore optimistic"

He replied with "Touche"

She wrapped her arms around Percy and tried not to sob. She'd never expected her life to be easy. Most demigods died young at the hands of terrible monsters. That was the way it had been since ancient times. The Greeks invented tragedy. They knew the greatest heroes didn't get happy endings.

Still, this wasn't fair. She'd gone through so much to retrieve that statue of Athena. Just when she'd succeeded, when things had been looking up and she'd been reunited with Percy, they had plunged to their deaths.

Even the gods couldn't devise a fate so twisted.

"I'm sure we could if we wanted to but it's not as if we actually wanted you to die" Hades said

But Gaea wasn't like other gods. The Earth Mother was older, more vicious, more bloodthirsty. Annabeth could imagine her laughing as they fell into the depths.

Annabeth pressed her lips to Percy's ear. "I love you."

She wasn't sure he could hear her-but if they were going to die she wanted those to be her last words.

"Aww" A lot have girls and Aphrodite said while I just rolled my eyes.

She tried desperately to think of a plan to save them. She was a daughter of Athena. She'd proven herself in the tunnels under Rome, beaten a whole series of challenges with only her wits. But she couldn't think of any way to reverse or even slow their fall.

Neither of them had the power to fly-not like Jason, who could control the wind, or Frank, who could turn into a winged animal. If they reached the bottom at terminal velocity...well, she knew enough science to know it would be terminal.

"You know a lot more science than that!" Athena said

She was seriously wondering whether they could fashion a parachute out of their shirts-that's how desperate she was-when something about their surroundings changed. The darkness took on a gray-red tinge. She realized she could see Percy's hair as she hugged him. The whistling in her ears turned into more of a roar. The air became intolerably hot, permeated with a smell like rotten eggs.

"Oh my gods that is so gross" Aphrodite said while gagging.

Suddenly, the chute they'd been falling through opened into a vast cavern. Maybe half a mile below them, Annabeth could see the bottom. For a moment she was too stunned to think properly. The entire island of Manhattan could have fit inside this cavern-and she couldn't even see its full extent. Red clouds hung in the air like vaporized blood. The landscape-at least what she could see of it-was rocky black plains, punctuated by jagged mountains and fiery chasms. To Annabeth's left, the ground dropped off in a series of cliffs, like colossal steps leading deeper into the abyss.

The stench of sulfur made it hard to concentrate, but she focused on the ground directly below them and saw a ribbon of glittering black liquid-a river.

"Percy!" she yelled in his ear. "Water!"

"No what are you thinking even I can't control the rivers have the underworld! Especially not the ones in Tartarus" My dad yelled.

She gestured frantically. Percy's face was hard to read in the dim red light. He looked shell-shocked and terrified, but he nodded as if he understood.

Percy could control water-assuming that was water below them. He might be able to cushion their fall somehow. Of course Annabeth had heard horrible stories about the rivers of the Underworld. They could take away your memories, or burn your body and soul to ashes. But she decided not to think about that. This was their only chance.

"Oh I can't look" My dad said and hid behind Hades who was starting to look annoyed by his brother.

The river hurtled toward them. At the last second, Percy yelled defiantly. The water erupted in a massive geyser and swallowed them whole.

"No!!! Percy!!! My dad said crying as he hugging Hades who was giving off a murderous aura before he yelled "Poseidon he is fine and right over there!" He said pointing at me. "Oh" was all my dad said.

"Um... I finished the chapter who wants to read next" Jake said.

"I will" Hades said.


	7. Annabeth VI

THE IMPACT DIDN'T KILL HER, but the cold nearly did.

Freezing water shocked the air right out of her lungs. Her limbs turned rigid, and she lost her grip on Percy. She began to sink. Strange wailing sounds filled her ears-millions of heartbroken voices, as if the river were made of distilled sadness. The voices were worse than the cold. They weighed her down and made her numb.

"The Cocytus the river of Misery" Athena said.

What's the point of struggling? they told her. You're dead anyway. You'll never leave this place.

She could sink to the bottom and drown, let the river carry her body away. That would be easier. She could just close her eyes....

"NO DON'T GIVE UP!!!" all the demigods yelled suddenly causing Annabeth to jump and fall off the couch we were on. I leaned over and helped her up while she glared at everyone and they we're apologising repeatedly.

Percy gripped her hand and jolted her back to reality. She couldn't see him in the murky water, but suddenly she didn't want to die. Together they kicked upward and broke the surface.

Annabeth gasped, grateful for the air, no matter how sulfurous. The water swirled around them, and she realized Percy was creating a whirlpool to buoy them up.

"Wow Percy is way more powerful and smarter than we usually give him credit for. Isn't that right Kelp Head?" Thalia said smirking from her spot next to Artemis. "Not really just being around Annabeth all the time makes me seem dumb." I respond sheepishly while everyone but Annabeth just stares at me. Surprisingly the one who broke the silence was Athena "I never thought about it that way but that does make a lot have since." Now it was my turn to stare at her. "Oh let's just start reading again Apollo said.

Though she couldn't make out their surroundings, she knew this was a river. Rivers had shores.

"Land," she croaked. "Go sideways."

Percy looked near dead with exhaustion. Usually water reinvigorated him, but not this water. Controlling it must have taken every bit of his strength. The whirlpool began to dissipate. Annabeth hooked one arm around his waist and struggled across the current. The river worked against her: thousands of weeping voices whispering in her ears, getting inside her brain.

Life is despair, they said. Everything is pointless, and then you die.

"Pointless," Percy murmured. His teeth chattered from the cold. He stopped swimming and began to sink.

"No! Don't listen to them! Don't give up!" Everyone yelled.

"Percy!" she shrieked. "The river is messing with your mind. It's the Cocytus-the River of Lamentation. It's made of pure misery!"

"Misery," he agreed.

"Fight it!"

She kicked and struggled, trying to keep both of them afloat. Another cosmic joke for Gaea to laugh at: Annabeth dies trying to keep her boyfriend, the son of Poseidon, from drowning.

Not going to happen, you hag, Annabeth thought.

"YOU TELL HER ANNABETH! Leo yelled at the top have his lungs scaring the mortals and some fell out have their seats while others started to laugh. Leo just sunk down in his seat.

She hugged Percy tighter and kissed him. "Tell me about New Rome," she demanded. "What were your plans for us?"

"New Rome...For us..."

"Yeah, Seaweed Brain. You said we could have a future there! Tell me!"

Lucy started laughing in the audience "Sorry it's just I can't imagine Percy actually planning something." Everyone else started to laugh now to and murmuring in agreement I just sighed. I don't plan because my plans never work. Hades started to read again once everyone had calmed down.

Annabeth had never wanted to leave Camp Half-Blood. It was the only real home she'd ever known. But days ago, on the Argo II, Percy had told her that he imagined a future for the two of them among the Roman demigods. In their city of New Rome, veterans of the legion could settle down safely, go to college, get married, even have kids.

"Architecture," Percy murmured. The fog started to clear from his eyes. "Thought you'd like the houses, the parks. There's one street with all these cool fountains."

"Of course he would mention the fountains. The whole time we we're showing them to him he wasn't really focused. I guess he must have been thinking about you the Annabeth." Frank commented causing both Annabeth and me to blush and turn away.

Annabeth started making progress against the current. Her limbs felt like bags of wet sand, but Percy was helping her now. She could see the dark line of the shore about a stone's throw away.

"College," she gasped. "Could we go there together?"

"Y-yeah," he agreed, a little more confidently.

"What would you study, Percy?"

"Dunno," he admitted.

"Marine science," she suggested. "Oceanography?"

"Surfing?" he asked.

She laughed, and the sound sent a shock wave through the water. The wailing faded to background noise. Annabeth wondered if anyone had ever laughed in Tartarus before-just a pure, simple laugh of pleasure. She doubted it.

"Maybe the monsters but demigods is a definite no" Hades answered and Annabeth nodded.

She used the last of her strength to reach the riverbank. Her feet dug into the sandy bottom. She and Percy hauled themselves ashore, shivering and gasping, and collapsed on the dark sand.

Annabeth wanted to curl up next to Percy and go to sleep. She wanted to shut her eyes, hope all of this was just a bad dream, and wake up to find herself back on the Argo II, safe with her friends (well...as safe as a demigod can ever be).

All the other members of the Argo II looked down wishing that had been the case as well.

But, no. They were really in Tartarus. At their feet, the River Cocytus roared past, a flood of liquid wretchedness. The sulfurous air stung Annabeth's lungs and prickled her skin. When she looked at her arms, she saw they were already covered with an angry rash. She tried to sit up and gasped in pain.

The beach wasn't sand. They were sitting on a field of jagged black-glass chips, some of which were now embedded in Annabeth's palms.

So the air was acid. The water was misery. The ground was broken glass. Everything here was designed to hurt and kill. Annabeth took a rattling breath and wondered if the voices in the Cocytus were right. Maybe fighting for survival was pointless. They would be dead within the hour.

"Wait, wait, wait, wait. Hold up a minute." A mortal teacher said from the audience. "How long were you down there and how are you still alive now? How did you guys even move?" "Um... I have no idea how long we were down there because it's hard to keep track. All we knew was it didn't move the same as time on the surface." I said. "Hey Jason how long were we down there in the surface world?" I asked curiously while Jason was counting on his fingers before replying "Um.. It was 18 days." "Well I am sure time moves faster there then because I am pretty sure we we're down there for at least a month." Everyone had pale faces while waiting for me to continue "As to how we are still currently alive you are going to have to wait and find out. Moving was very hard at first until we got used to it but don't underestimate the power of determination." I then without letting anyone have time to comment any further I got up and walked over to Hades and snapped my fingers in his face breaking him out of his daze before walking back over to Annabeth.

Next to her, Percy coughed. "This place smells like my ex-stepfather."

Annabeth managed a weak smile. She'd never met Smelly Gabe, but she'd heard enough stories. She loved Percy for trying to lift her spirits.

If she'd fallen into Tartarus by herself, Annabeth thought, she would have been doomed. After all she'd been through beneath Rome, finding the Athena Parthenos, this was simply too much. She would've curled up and cried until she became another ghost, melting into the Cocytus.

But she wasn't alone. She had Percy. And that meant she couldn't give up.

She forced herself to take stock. Her foot was still wrapped in its makeshift cast of board and Bubble Wrap, still tangled in cobwebs. But when she moved it, it didn't hurt. The ambrosia she'd eaten in the tunnels under Rome must have finally mended her bones.

"Well that's one good thing at least" Piper said making Annabeth smile at her friends optimism.

Her backpack was gone-lost during the fall, or maybe washed away in the river. She hated losing Daedalus's laptop, with all its fantastic programs and data, but she had worse problems. Her Celestial bronze dagger was missing-the weapon she'd carried since she was seven years old.

The realization almost broke her, but she couldn't let herself dwell on it. Time to grieve later. What else did they have?

"Wait that whole time you we're down there you didn't even have a weapon?" Paul asked worried about how many injuries he had gotten before they had escaped. "Well most of the time, I got my new sword while I was down there. My friend gave it to me because he didn't want me to be without a weapon anymore." Annabeth answered starting to cry and confusing a lot of people. While I was calming my girlfriend and wiping her tears I could practically feel the questions going through everyone's heads. 'Friend in Tartarus'.

No food, no water...basically no supplies at all.

Yep. Off to a promising start.

Annabeth glanced at Percy. He looked pretty bad. His dark hair was plastered across his forehead, his T-shirt ripped to shreds. His fingers were scraped raw from holding on to that ledge before they fell. Most worrisome of all, he was shivering and his lips were blue.

Everyone shivered imagining what they looked like while Poseidon and Athena were really worried for their children.

"We should keep moving or we'll get hypothermia," Annabeth said. "Can you stand?"

He nodded. They both struggled to their feet.

Annabeth put her arm around his waist, though she wasn't sure who was supporting whom. She scanned their surroundings. Above, she saw no sign of the tunnel they'd fallen down. She couldn't even see the cavern roof-just blood-colored clouds floating in the hazy gray air. It was like staring through a thin mix of tomato soup and cement.

The black-glass beach stretched inland about fifty yards, then dropped off the edge of a cliff. From where she stood, Annabeth couldn't see what was below, but the edge flickered with red light as if illuminated by huge fires.

A distant memory tugged at her-something about Tartarus and fire. Before she could think too much about it, Percy inhaled sharply.

"Look." He pointed downstream.

A hundred feet away, a familiar-looking baby-blue Italian car had crashed headfirst into the sand. It looked just like the Fiat that had smashed into Arachne and sent her plummeting into the pit.

"Oh no" Was all everyone could think at this point terrified what could happen to their friends.

Annabeth hoped she was wrong, but how many Italian sports cars could there be in Tartarus? Part of her didn't want to go anywhere near it, but she had to find out. She gripped Percy's hand, and they stumbled toward the wreckage. One of the car's tires had come off and was floating in a backwater eddy of the Cocytus. The Fiat's windows had shattered, sending brighter glass like frosting across the dark beach. Under the crushed hood lay the tattered, glistening remains of a giant silk cocoon-the trap that Annabeth had tricked Arachne into weaving. It was unmistakably empty. Slash marks in the sand made a trail downriver...as if something heavy, with multiple legs, had scuttled into the darkness.

"She's alive." Annabeth was so horrified, so outraged by the unfairness of it all, she had to suppress the urge to throw up.

"It's Tartarus," Percy said. "Monster home court. Down here, maybe they can't be killed."

He gave Annabeth an embarrassed look, as if realizing he wasn't helping team morale.

"How Percy that was the exact thing you should say in a case like this." Nico said sarcastically.

"Or maybe she's badly wounded, and she crawled away to die."

"Let's go with that," Annabeth agreed.

"Nice save Bro!" Jason said giving the thumbs up but it was probably more to help convince himself than me.

Percy was still shivering. Annabeth wasn't feeling any warmer either, despite the hot, sticky air. The glass cuts on her hands were still bleeding, which was unusual for her. Normally, she healed fast. Her breathing got more and more labored.

"This place is killing us," she said. "I mean, it's literally going to kill us, unless..."

Tartarus. Fire. That distant memory came into focus. She gazed inland toward the cliff, illuminated by flames from below.

"That is a really stupid and crazy idea but I do agree it is probably your only chance at this point." Athena commented guessing about what Annabeth was talking about but leaving everyone else confused.

It was an absolutely crazy idea. But it might be their only chance.

"Like mother like daughter. Great minds think alike." I said while hugging Annabeth and giving her a kiss on her nose that made her blush. Piper started to squeal in the background until Nico spoke up " Piper your Aphrodite is showing." she calmed down but Aphrodite then commented "You say it like it's a bad thing" We all just sweat dropped and Piper was fake gagging in the background.

"Unless what?" Percy prompted. "You've got a brilliant plan, haven't you?"

"It's a plan," Annabeth murmured. "I don't know about brilliant. We need to find the River of Fire."

"Chapters over now" Hades announced to us before Jason and a mortal Jock both said they wanted to read so they did rock paper scissors. Needless to say Jason won and the Jock is going to read after him. Jason then started to read.


	8. Annabeth VII

WHEN THEY REACHED THE LEDGE, Annabeth was sure she'd signed their death warrants.

"That doesn't sound reassuring" Frank commented dryly with worry etched on his face.

The cliff dropped more than eighty feet. At the bottom stretched a nightmarish version of the Grand Canyon: a river of fire cutting a path through a jagged obsidian crevasse, the glowing red current casting horrible shadows across the cliff faces.

Even from the top of the canyon, the heat was intense. The chill of the River Cocytus hadn't left Annabeth's bones, but now her face felt raw and sunburned. Every breath took more effort, as if her chest was filled with Styrofoam peanuts. The cuts on her hands bled more rather than less. Annabeth's foot, which had been almost healed, seemed to be reinjuring itself. She'd taken off her makeshift cast, but now she regretted it. Each step made her wince.

Apollo was the most worried by this and was doing a mental examination of both Percy and Annabeth to make sure they didn't have any lasting or permanent damage done.

Assuming they could make it down to the fiery river, which she doubted, her plan seemed certifiably insane.

"Uh..." Percy examined the cliff. He pointed to a tiny fissure running diagonally from the edge to the bottom. "We can try that ledge there. Might be able to climb down."

He didn't say they'd be crazy to try. He managed to sound hopeful. Annabeth was grateful for that, but she also worried that she was leading him to his doom.

Of course if they stayed here, they would die anyway. Blisters had started to form on their arms from exposure to the Tartarus air. The whole environment was about as healthy as a nuclear blast zone.

"Probably worse than that I am honestly surprised you demigods made it this far, I don't think anyone else has been to tartarus that has survived but I doubt they would have made it this far." Hades said from his spot with the gods. "Um... Actually dad... I have been to Tartarus" Nico spoke up quietly. Everyone who didn't already know (Hazel, Percy and Frank) turned to look at the son of Hades in shock. "How? When? Why?" Jason and Hades started to ask in union startling Nico by everyone's concern for him. "I went to close the doors of Death on the Tartarus side and I told Percy, Hazel and Frank before they left on their quest for Alaska but I only said it was in the underworld so they wouldn't try to stop me." Nico said looking down. "I didn't get two feet though because I was immediately captured by the Giants and brought to Rome and put in that awful jar."

Percy went first. The ledge was barely wide enough to allow a toehold. Their hands clawed for any crack in the glassy rock. Every time Annabeth put pressure on her bad foot, she wanted to yelp. She'd ripped off the sleeves of her T-shirt and used the cloth to wrap her bloody palms, but her fingers were still slippery and weak.

A few steps below her, Percy grunted as he reached for another handhold. "So...what is this fire river called?"

"The Phlegethon," she said. "You should concentrate on going down."

"The Phlegethon?" He shinnied along the ledge. They'd made it roughly a third of the way down the cliff-still high enough up to die if they fell. "Sounds like a marathon for hawking spitballs."

"Please don't make me laugh," she said.

"Just trying to keep things light."

"Thanks," she grunted, nearly missing the ledge with her bad foot. "I'll have a smile on my face as I plummet to my death."

"Wow Annabeth you are being way too pessimistic" Leo said

They kept going, one step at a time. Annabeth's eyes stung with sweat. Her arms trembled. But to her amazement, they finally made it to the bottom of the cliff.

When she reached the ground, she stumbled. Percy caught her. She was alarmed by how feverish his skin felt. Red boils had erupted on his face, so he looked like a smallpox victim.

The mortals shivered while trying to imagine what he had looked like while the demigods and gods only paled.

Her own vision was blurry. Her throat felt blistered, and her stomach was clenched tighter than a fist.

We have to hurry, she thought.

"Just to the river," she told Percy, trying to keep the panic out of her voice. "We can do this."

They staggered over slick glass ledges, around massive boulders, avoiding stalagmites that would've impaled them with any slip of the foot. Their tattered clothes steamed from the heat of the river, but they kept going until they crumpled to their knees at the banks of the Phlegethon.

"We have to drink," Annabeth said.

Percy swayed, his eyes half-closed. It took him a three-count to respond. "Uh...drink fire?"

"The Phlegethon flows from Hades's realm down into Tartarus." Annabeth could barely talk. Her throat was closing up from the heat and the acidic air. "The river is used to punish the wicked. But also...some legends call it the River of Healing."

"Wait some legends, I don't think you can go by some legends" Lucy called from her seat in the audience. "We have to take a lot of risks just to survive and not all of them work but it's just all part of being a demigod." Jason replied sadly thinking about all the friends he has lost.

"Some legends?"

Annabeth swallowed, trying to stay conscious. "The Phlegethon keeps the wicked in one piece so that they can endure the torments of the Fields of Punishment. I think...it might be the Underworld equivalent of ambrosia and nectar."

Percy winced as cinders sprayed from the river, curling around his face. "But it's fire. How can we-"

"Like this." Annabeth thrust her hands into the river.

Stupid? Yes, but she was convinced they had no choice. If they waited any longer, they would pass out and die. Better to try something foolish and hope it worked.

On first contact, the fire wasn't painful. It felt cold, which probably meant it was so hot it was overloading Annabeth's nerves. Before she could change her mind, she cupped the fiery liquid in her palms and raised it to her mouth.

She expected a taste like gasoline. It was so much worse. Once, at a restaurant back in San Francisco, she'd made the mistake of tasting a ghost chili pepper that came with a plate of Indian food. After barely nibbling it, she thought her respiratory system was going to implode. Drinking from the Phlegethon was like gulping down a ghost chili smoothie. Her sinuses filled with liquid flame. Her mouth felt like it was being deep-fried. Her eyes shed boiling tears, and every pore on her face popped. She collapsed, gagging and retching, her whole body shaking violently.

Annabeth was starting to turn green just thinking about the taste of it and so Percy rubbed her back soothingly.

"Annabeth!" Percy grabbed her arms and just managed to stop her from rolling into the river.

The convulsions passed. She took a ragged breath and managed to sit up. She felt horribly weak and nauseous, but her next breath came more easily. The blisters on her arms were starting to fade.

The mortals sighed in relief while the demigods and gods all just relaxed a little but were still tense knowing anything could still happen.

"It worked," she croaked. "Percy, you've got to drink."

"I..." His eyes rolled up in his head, and he slumped against her.

"No!" Everyone yelled while Percy just yelled over them, "HELLO STILL HERE".

Desperately, she cupped more fire in her palm. Ignoring the pain, she dripped the liquid into Percy's mouth. He didn't respond.

She tried again, pouring a whole handful down his throat. This time he spluttered and coughed. Annabeth held him as he trembled, the magical fire coursing through his system. His fever disappeared. His boils faded. He managed to sit up and smack his lips.

"Ugh," he said. "Spicy, yet disgusting."

Annabeth laughed weakly. She was so relieved, she felt light-headed. "Yeah. That pretty much sums it up."

Now everyone sighed in relief even though the demigods were still tense.

"You saved us."

"For now," she said. "The problem is, we're still in Tartarus."

Percy blinked. He looked around as if just coming to terms with where they were. "Holy Hera. I never thought...well, I'm not sure what I thought. Maybe that Tartarus was empty space, a pit with no bottom. But this is a real place."

Annabeth recalled the landscape she'd seen while they fell-a series of plateaus leading ever downward into the gloom.

"We haven't seen all of it," she warned. "This could be just the first tiny part of the abyss, like the front steps."

"The welcome mat," Percy muttered.

"I'm feeling sick" Annabeth said while hugging Percy as tight as possible. "Me too just try not to think about it too much ok." He responded hugging her back. All the other demigods and mortals gazed at them sympathetically.

They both gazed up at the blood-colored clouds swirling in the gray haze. No way would they have the strength to climb back up that cliff, even if they wanted to. Now there were only two choices: downriver or upriver, skirting the banks of the Phlegethon.

"We'll find a way out," Percy said. "The Doors of Death."

Annabeth shuddered. She remembered what Percy had said just before they fell into Tartarus. He'd made Nico di Angelo promise to lead the Argo II to Epirus, to the mortal side of the Doors of Death.

We'll see you there, Percy had said.

That idea seemed even crazier than drinking fire. How could the two of them wander through Tartarus and find the Doors of Death? They'd barely been able to stumble a hundred yards in this poisonous place without dying.

"That is a really good point you know" Jake said.

"We have to," Percy said. "Not just for us. For everybody we love. The Doors have to be closed on both sides, or the monsters will just keep coming through. Gaea's forces will overrun the world."

Annabeth knew he was right. Still...when she tried to imagine a plan that could succeed, the logistics overwhelmed her. They had no way of locating the Doors. They didn't know how much time it would take, or even if time flowed at the same speed in Tartarus. How could they possibly synchronize a meeting with their friends? And Nico had mentioned a legion of Gaea's strongest monsters guarding the Doors on the Tartarus side. Annabeth and Percy couldn't exactly launch a frontal assault.

"Another problem that will be hard to solve" Lucy said.

She decided not to mention any of that. They both knew the odds were bad. Besides, after swimming in the River Cocytus, Annabeth had heard enough whining and moaning to last a lifetime. She promised herself never to complain again.

"You never complained as if was Annabeth" Piper said remembering.

"Well." She took a deep breath, grateful at least that her lungs didn't hurt. "If we stay close to the river, we'll have a way to heal ourselves. If we go downstream-"

It happened so fast, Annabeth would have been dead if she'd been on her own.

"WHAT NOW?!" Demeter said nervously. She had never particularly liked demigods except her own children but these two Intrigued her.

Percy's eyes locked on something behind her. Annabeth spun as a massive dark shape hurtled down at her-a snarling, monstrous blob with spindly barbed legs and glinting eyes.

She had time to think: Arachne. But she was frozen in terror, her senses smothered by the sickly sweet smell.

Then she heard the familiar SHINK of Percy's ballpoint pen transforming into a sword. His blade swept over her head in a glowing bronze arc. A horrible wail echoed through the canyon.

"You moved way too fast for a demigod, how did you do that?!" Zeus said mystified. I chose not to answer so Jason continued to read.

Annabeth stood there, stunned, as yellow dust-the remains of Arachne-rained around her like tree pollen.

"You okay?" Percy scanned the cliffs and boulders, alert for more monsters, but nothing else appeared. The golden dust of the spider settled on the obsidian rocks.

Annabeth stared at her boyfriend in amazement. Riptide's Celestial bronze blade glowed even brighter in the gloom of Tartarus. As it passed through the thick hot air, it made a defiant hiss like a riled snake.

"She...she would've killed me," Annabeth stammered.

Percy kicked the dust on the rocks, his expression grim and dissatisfied. "She died too easily, considering how much torture she put you through. She deserved worse."

Annabeth couldn't argue with that, but the hard edge in Percy's voice made her unsettled. She'd never seen someone get so angry or vengeful on her behalf. It almost made her glad Arachne had died quickly. "How did you move so fast?"

Percy shrugged. "Gotta watch each other's backs, right? Now, you were saying...downstream?"

"Only you could just brush something like that off Percy" Leo said scowling for some weird reason I didn't understand.

Annabeth nodded, still in a daze. The yellow dust dissipated on the rocky shore, turning to steam. At least now they knew monsters could be killed in Tartarus...though she had no idea how long Arachne would remain dead. Annabeth didn't plan on staying long enough to find out.

"Yeah, downstream," she managed. "If the river comes from the upper levels of the Underworld, it should flow deeper into Tartarus-"

"So it leads into more dangerous territory," Percy finished. "Which is probably where the Doors are. Lucky us."

"That's the end" Jason said quietly while he closed the book. "Who wants to read now?"


	9. Annabeth VIII

"I'll read Zeus said picking up the book fro his son and opening it to the correct page."

THEY'D ONLY TRAVELED a few hundred yards when Annabeth heard voices.

Everyone tensed knowing it had to be some kind of monster.

Annabeth plodded along, half in a stupor, trying to form a plan. Since she was a daughter of Athena, plans were supposed to be her specialty; but it was hard to strategize with her stomach growling and her throat baking. The fiery water of the Phlegethon may have healed her and given her strength, but it didn't do anything for her hunger or thirst. The river wasn't about making you feel good, Annabeth guessed. It just kept you going so you could experience more excruciating pain.

"Your not wrong but that's still not exactly right" Hades said.

Her head started to droop with exhaustion. Then she heard them-female voices having some sort of argument-and she was instantly alert.

Everyone in the room tensed while Annabeth was seathing just thinking about the empousa Kelli.

She whispered, "Percy, down!"

She pulled him behind the nearest boulder, wedging herself so close against the riverbank that her shoes almost touched the river's fire. On the other side, in the narrow path between the river and the cliffs, voices snarled, getting louder as they approached from upstream.

Annabeth tried to steady her breathing. The voices sounded vaguely human, but that meant nothing. She assumed anything in Tartarus was their enemy. She didn't know how the monsters could have failed to spot them already. Besides, monsters could smell demigods-especially powerful ones like Percy, son of Poseidon. Annabeth doubted that hiding behind a boulder would do any good when the monsters caught their scent.

Still, as the monsters got nearer, their voices didn't change in tone. Their uneven footsteps-scrap, clump, scrap, clump-didn't get any faster.

All the demigods and gods recognized the description and gasped because they knew empousi were dangerous on their own but this was obviously more than one in a group ready to attack. The mortals were all looking confused at the demigods reactions but decided not to ask so they could find out faster.

"Soon?" one of them asked in a raspy voice, as if she'd been gargling in the Phlegethon.

"Oh my gods!" said another voice. This one sounded much younger and much more human, like a teenaged mortal girl getting exasperated with her friends at the mall. For some reason, she sounded familiar to Annabeth. "You guys are totally annoying! I told you, it's like three days from here."

Percy gripped Annabeth's wrist. He looked at her with alarm, as if he recognized the mall girl's voice too.

"Of course you guys recognized recognized you have fought like every greek mythological in existence." Jason said exasperated at his friends bad luck.

There was a chorus of growling and grumbling. The creatures-maybe half a dozen, Annabeth guessed-had paused just on the other side of the boulder, but still they gave no indication that they'd caught the demigods' scent. Annabeth wondered if demigods didn't smell the same in Tartarus, or if the other scents here were so powerful, they masked a demigod's aura.

"I wonder," said a third voice, gravelly and ancient like the first, "if perhaps you do not know the way, young one."

"Oh, shut your fang hole, Serephone," said the mall girl. "When's the last time you escaped to the mortal world? I was there a couple of years ago. I know the way! Besides, I understand what we're facing up there. You don't have a clue!"

"Wow that's a new one on me" Piper said impressed at the vampires language.

"The Earth Mother did not make you boss!" shrieked a fourth voice.

More hissing, scuffling, and feral moans-like giant alley cats fighting. At last the one called Serephone yelled, "Enough!"

The scuffling died down.

"We will follow for now," Serephone said. "But if you do not lead us well, if we find you have lied about the summons of Gaea-"

"I don't lie!" snapped the mall girl. "Believe me, I've got good reason to get into this battle. I have some enemies to devour, and you'll feast on the blood of heroes. Just leave one special morsel for me-the one named Percy Jackson."

"Seriously Percy does every monster you've met have this big a grudge on you for killing them" Leo commented looking pointedly at Percy. "Um should I really answer that."

Annabeth fought down a snarl of her own. She forgot about her fear. She wanted to jump over the boulder and slash the monsters to dust with her knife...except she didn't have it anymore.

"Believe me," said the mall girl. "Gaea has called us, and we're going to have so much fun. Before this war is over, mortals and demigods will tremble at the sound of my name-Kelli!"

Annabeth almost yelped aloud. She glanced at Percy. Even in the red light of the Phlegethon, his face seemed waxy.

Empousai, she mouthed. Vampires.

Percy nodded grimly.

"Vampires are a part of Greek mythology?" A mortal asked. "Yes but they are very different from all your stories and fairy tales." Demeter retorted glaring at the mortal for interupting.

She remembered Kelli. Two years ago, at Percy's freshman orientation, he and their friend Rachel Dare had been attacked by empousai disguised as cheerleaders. One of them had been Kelli. Later, the same empousa had attacked them in Daedalus's workshop. Annabeth had stabbed her in the back and sent her...here. To Tartarus.

"Lovely" Hazel said grimly.

The creatures shuffled off, their voices getting fainter. Annabeth crept to the edge of the boulder and risked a glimpse. Sure enough, five women staggered along on mismatched legs-mechanical bronze on the left, shaggy and cloven-hooved on the right. Their hair was made of fire, their skin as white as bone. Most of them wore tattered Ancient Greek dresses, except for the one in the lead, Kelli, who wore a burned and torn blouse with a short pleated skirt...her cheerleader's outfit.

Annabeth gritted her teeth. She had faced a lot of bad monsters over the years, but she hated empousai more than most.

In addition to their nasty claws and fangs, they had a powerful ability to manipulate the Mist. They could change shape and charmspeak, tricking mortals into letting down their guard. Men were especially susceptible. The empousa's favorite tactic was to make a guy fall in love with her, then drink his blood and devour his flesh. Not a great first date.

"I second that" Thalia said grimacing.

Kelli had almost killed Percy. She had manipulated Annabeth's oldest friend, Luke, urging him to commit darker and darker deeds in the name of Kronos.

Annabeth really wished she still had her dagger.

Percy rose. "They're heading for the Doors of Death," he murmured. "You know what that means?"

Annabeth didn't want to think about it, but sadly, this squad of flesh-eating horror-show women might be the closest thing to good luck they were going to get in Tartarus.

"Yeah," she said. "We need to follow them."

"Wow that's a brilliant plan. Really stupid but also your only option."

"I'm finished with the chapter"


	10. Leo IX

LEO SPENT THE NIGHT WRESTLING with a forty-foot-tall Athena.

"Um... What" Annabeth said confused glancing at Leo who looked over at her sheepishly.

Ever since they'd brought the statue aboard, Leo had been obsessed with figuring out how it worked. He was sure it had primo powers. There had to be a secret switch or a pressure plate or something.

"Leo it's a magic statue not mechanical." Piper said to Leo who was trying to hide behind Jason for some unknown reason.

He was supposed to be sleeping, but he just couldn't. He spent hours crawling over the statue, which took up most of the lower deck. Athena's feet stuck into sick bay, so you had to squeeze past her ivory toes if you wanted some Advil. Her body ran the length of the port corridor, her outstretched hand jutting into the engine room, offering the life-sized figure of Nike that stood in her palm, like, Here, have some Victory! Athena's serene face took up most of the aft pegasus stables, which were fortunately unoccupied. If Leo were a magic horse, he wouldn't have wanted to live in a stall with an oversized goddess of wisdom staring at him.

"Excuse me what did you say!?" Athena exclaimed glaring at Leo who was still hiding behind Jason for protection all the while Jason is trying to stop himself from busting out laughing. I guess I figured out why he was hiding then.

The statue was wedged tight in the corridor, so Leo had to climb over the top and wriggle under her limbs, searching for levers and buttons.

As usual, he found nothing.

He'd done some research on the statue. He knew it was made from a hollow wooden frame covered in ivory and gold, which explained why it was so light. It was in pretty good shape, considering it was more than two thousand years old, had been pillaged from Athens, toted to Rome, and secretly stored in a spider's cavern for most of the past two millennia. Magic must've kept it intact, Leo figured, combined with really good craftsmanship.

Annabeth had said...well, he tried not to think about Annabeth. He still felt guilty about her and Percy falling into Tartarus. Leo knew it was his fault. He should have gotten everyone safely on board the Argo II before he started securing the statue. He should have realized the cavern floor was unstable.

"Leo it wasn't your fault that we fell you were more focused on the statue and that was our mission and it was more important than us anyway. If we had lost the statue and you had saved us instead we never would have been able to make peace between us and the Romans. Also We had a chance of surviving and making it out unlike a statue that can't move." Annabeth explained to Leo who was looking guilty. I beckoned him over and he cautiously walked over like we were something radioactive. I patted the seat next to me and Annabeth for him to sit down on and his eyes lit up and he took a flying leap to the couch somehow ending up ok.

Still, moping around wasn't going to get Percy and Annabeth back. He had to concentrate on fixing the problems he could fix.

Anyway, Annabeth had said the statue was the key to defeating Gaea. It could heal the rift between Greek and Roman demigods. Leo figured there had to be more to it than just symbolism. Maybe Athena's eyes shot lasers, or the snake behind her shield could spit poison. Or maybe the smaller figure of Nike came to life and busted out some ninja moves.

Leo could think of all kinds of fun things the statue might do if he had designed it, but the more he examined it, the more frustrated he got. The Athena Parthenos radiated magic. Even he could feel that. But it didn't seem to do anything except look impressive.

Athena continued to glare at Leo.

The ship careened to one side, taking evasive maneuvers. Leo resisted the urge to run to the helm. Jason, Piper, and Frank were on duty with Hazel now. They could handle whatever was going on. Besides, Hazel had insisted on taking the wheel to guide them through the secret pass that the magic goddess had told her about.

Leo hoped Hazel was right about the long detour north. He didn't trust this Hecate lady. He didn't see why such a creepy goddess would suddenly decide to be helpful.

"Leo you seriously need to stop being rude to the gods even mentally because now they know what you were thinking and they aren't going to be happy" Nico said to Leo very seriously.

Of course, he didn't trust magic in general. That's why he was having so much trouble with the Athena Parthenos. It had no moving parts. Whatever it did, it apparently operated on pure sorcery...and Leo didn't appreciate that. He wanted it to make sense, like a machine.

Finally he got too exhausted to think straight. He curled up with a blanket in the engine room and listened to the soothing hum of the generators. Buford the mechanical table sat in the corner on sleep mode, making little steamy snores: Shhh, pfft, shh, pfft.

Leo liked his quarters okay, but he felt safest here in the heart of the ship-in a room filled with mechanisms he knew how to control. Besides, maybe if he spent more time close to the Athena Parthenos, he would eventually soak in its secrets.

"It's you or me, Big Lady," he murmured as he pulled the blanket up to his chin. "You're gonna cooperate eventually."

He closed his eyes and slept. Unfortunately, that meant dreams.

All the demigods groaned at this and some shivered as well causing the mortals to get very curious. "What's wrong with dreaming?" Lucy asked. "It's kind of hard to explain but for a demigod dreams are never just dreams. They show you the future or what's going on at the current moment in the world or sometimes even the past but it is always very vivid and dangerous. Most have a hidden message or you were summoned by someone to see your worst fear. I guess you will hear one now." I explained shivering at the thought because even by demigod standards mine were pretty bad.

He was running for his life through his mother's old workshop, where she'd died in a fire when Leo was eight.

Leo had tears in his eyes just remembering his mother and he tried to wipe them away before anyone noticed but Piper caught him. She nudged Jason and pulled him up and dragged him over and sat next to Leo on the couch and started rubbing his back comfortingly. "Thanks Beauty Queen" she heard him mumble and for once she didn't care about the nickname.

He wasn't sure what was chasing him, but he sensed it closing fast-something large and dark and full of hate.

He stumbled into workbenches, knocked over toolboxes, and tripped on electrical cords. He spotted the exit and sprinted toward it, but a figure loomed in front of him-a woman in robes of dry swirling earth, her face covered in a veil of dust.

Where are you going, little hero? Gaea asked. Stay, and meet my favorite son.

"How many favorite sons did she have because I remember her saying that more than once if I am remembering correctly?" Frank asked causing all the other demigods to shrug.

Leo darted to the left, but the Earth Goddess's laughter followed him.

The night your mother died, I warned you. I said the Fates would not allow me to kill you then. But now you have chosen your path. Your death is near, Leo Valdez.

"She knew you were going to die!" Hazel yelled in frustration. The mortals who had never seen Hazel when angry all stared startled at the innocent looking little girl.

He ran into a drafting table-his mother's old workstation. The wall behind it was decorated with Leo's crayon drawings. He sobbed in desperation and turned, but the thing pursuing him now stood in his path-a colossal being wrapped in shadows, its shape vaguely humanoid, its head almost scraping the ceiling twenty feet above.

"Sounds like the perfect description of Clytius except you didn't insult him" I said while shaking my head. "How would you know you were unconscious the entire time this fight was going on!" Leo retorted. "Ok, good point I did only see the very very end" I admit.

Leo's hands burst into flame. He blasted the giant, but the darkness consumed his fire. Leo reached for his tool belt. The pockets were sewn shut. He tried to speak-to say anything that would save his life-but he couldn't make a sound, as if the air had been stolen from his lungs.

My son will not allow any fires tonight, Gaea said from the depths of the warehouse. He is the void that consumes all magic, the cold that consumes all fire, the silence that consumes all speech.

Leo wanted to shout: And I'm the dude that's all out of here!

"Ha! Classic Leo everyone!" Jason said while laughing causing Leo to blush red and curse Jason in Ancient Greek I don't want to repeat.

His voice didn't work, so he used his feet. He dashed to the right, ducking under the shadowy giant's grasping hands, and burst through the nearest doorway.

Suddenly, he found himself at Camp Half-Blood, except the camp was in ruins. The cabins were charred husks. Burned fields smoldered in the moonlight. The dining pavilion had collapsed into a pile of white rubble, and the Big House was on fire, its windows glowing like demon eyes.

All the demigods eyes darkened at the description of their home.

Leo kept running, sure the shadow giant was still behind him.

He wove around the bodies of Greek and Roman demigods. He wanted to check if they were alive. He wanted to help them. But somehow he knew he was running out of time.

He jogged toward the only living people he saw-a group of Romans standing at the volleyball pit. Two centurions leaned casually on their javelins, chatting with a tall skinny blond guy in a purple toga. Leo stumbled. It was that freak Octavian, the augur from Camp Jupiter, who was always screaming for war.

"At least now he can't hurt anyone else" Reyna spat while all the mortals just looked confused until she waved them off.

Octavian turned to face him, but he seemed to be in a trance. His features were slack, his eyes closed. When he spoke, it was in Gaea's voice: This cannot be prevented. The Romans move east from New York. They advance on your camp, and nothing can slow them down.

Leo was tempted to punch Octavian in the face. Instead he kept running.

"We all wanted to punch Octavian in the face Leo" Frank said cracking his knuckles for effect and for once he actually looked like a son of Mars and that made me make a mental note to not make Frank angry.

He climbed Half-Blood Hill. At the summit, lightning had splintered the giant pine tree.

He faltered to a stop. The back of the hill was shorn away. Beyond it, the entire world was gone. Leo saw nothing but clouds far below-a rolling silver carpet under the dark sky.

A sharp voice said, "Well?"

Leo flinched.

At the shattered pine tree, a woman knelt at a cave entrance that had cracked open between the tree's roots.

The woman wasn't Gaea. She looked more like a living Athena Parthenos, with the same golden robes and bare ivory arms. When she rose, Leo almost stumbled off the edge of the world.

Her face was regally beautiful, with high cheekbones, large dark eyes, and braided licorice-colored hair piled in a fancy Greek hairdo, set with a spiral of emeralds and diamonds so that it reminded Leo of a Christmas tree. Her expression radiated pure hatred. Her lip curled. Her nose wrinkled.

"You saw Pasiphae too" Hazel asked looking kind of shocked. "Um... Yea it was a very informative dream I guess."

"The tinkerer god's child," she sneered. "You are no threat, but I suppose my vengeance must start somewhere. Make your choice."

Leo tried to speak, but he was about to crawl out of his skin with panic. Between this hate queen and the giant chasing him, he had no idea what to do.

"He'll be here soon," the woman warned. "My dark friend will not give you the luxury of a choice. It's the cliff or the cave, boy!"

Suddenly Leo understood what she meant. He was cornered. He could jump off the cliff, but that was suicide. Even if there was land under those clouds, he would die in the fall, or maybe he would just keep falling forever.

But the cave... He stared at the dark opening between the tree roots. It smelled of rot and death. He heard bodies shuffling inside, voices whispering in the shadows.

The cave was the home of the dead. If he went down there, he would never come back.

"Yes," the woman said. Around her neck hung a strange bronze-and-emerald pendant, like a circular labyrinth. Her eyes were so angry, Leo finally understood why mad was a word for crazy. This lady had been driven nuts by hatred. "The House of Hades awaits. You will be the first puny rodent to die in my maze. You have only one chance to escape, Leo Valdez. Take it."

She gestured toward the cliff.

"You're bonkers," he managed.

That was the wrong thing to say. She seized his wrist. "Perhaps I should kill you now, before my dark friend arrives?"

Steps shook the hillside. The giant was coming, wrapped in shadows, huge and heavy and bent on murder.

"Have you heard of dying in a dream, boy?" the woman asked. "It is possible, at the hands of a sorceress!"

Leo's arm started to smoke. The woman's touch was acid. He tried to free himself, but her grip was like steel.

He opened his mouth to scream. The massive shape of the giant loomed over him, obscured by layers of black smoke.

The giant raised his fist, and a voice cut through the dream.

"Oh thank the gods who ever woke you up or you might not have survived!" Jason yelled giving his best friend a tight hug "Actually it was you man"

"Leo!" Jason was shaking his shoulder. "Hey, man, why are you hugging Nike?"

Leo's eyes fluttered open. His arms were wrapped around the human-sized statue in Athena's hand. He must have been thrashing in his sleep. He clung to the victory goddess like he used to cling to his pillow when he had nightmares as a kid. (Man, that had been so embarrassing in the foster homes.)

I saw Thalia writing something down in a notebook she had gotten from seemingly nowhere. She was probably planning a prank or something so I focused back on the book.

He disentangled himself and sat up, rubbing his face.

"Nothing," he muttered. "We were just cuddling. Um, what's going on?"

Jason didn't tease him. That's one thing Leo appreciated about his friend. Jason's ice-blue eyes were level and serious. The little scar on his mouth twitched like it always did when he had bad news to share.

"Never knew you were that observant Leo" Jason commented to Leo impressed and Leo mock bowed to Jason and said "I do try"

"We made it through the mountains," he said. "We're almost to Bologna. You should join us in the mess hall. Nico has new information."

"I'm done who is next?" "I'll read if that's ok" Thalia said while picking up the book.


	11. Leo X

Thalia picked up the book and began to read.

LEO HAD DESIGNED the mess hall's walls to show real-time scenes from Camp Half-Blood. At first he had thought that was a pretty awesome idea. Now he wasn't so sure.

"Wait that sounds really cool why don't you like the idea anymore" Thalia asked confused. Leo just motioned for her to continue reading.

The scenes from back home—the campfire sing-alongs, dinners at the pavilion, volleyball games outside the Big House—just seemed to make his friends sad. The farther they got from Long Island, the worse it got. The time zones kept changing, making Leo feel the distance every time he looked at the walls. Here in Italy the sun had just come up. Back at Camp Half-Blood it was the middle of the night. Torches sputtered at the cabin doorways. Moonlight glittered on the waves of Long Island Sound. The beach was covered in footprints, as if a big crowd had just left.

"Camp Half Blood sounds really cool, are you all half bloods their." We all nod our heads smiling as we remember all the fun we have had with all our friends at home. "It's our home" I muttered but I'm positive everyone heard me.

With a start, Leo realized that yesterday—last night, whatever—had been the Fourth of July. They'd missed Camp Half-Blood's annual party at the beach with awesome fireworks prepared by Leo's siblings in Cabin Nine.

He decided not to mention that to the crew, but he hoped their buddies back home had had a good celebration. They needed something to keep their spirits up, too.

He remembered the images he'd seen in his dream—the camp in ruins, littered with bodies; Octavian standing at the volleyball pit, casually talking in Gaea's voice.

All the demigods looked murderous at the mention of Octavian's name causing the mortals to wonder why they all hate him and what he did to them.

He stared down at his eggs and bacon. He wished he could turn off the wall videos.

"So," Jason said, "now that we're here..."

He sat at the head of the table, kind of by default. Since they'd lost Annabeth, Jason had done his best to act as the group's leader. Having been praetor back at Camp Jupiter, he was probably used to that; but Leo could tell his friend was stressed. His eyes were more sunken than usual. His blond hair was uncharacteristically messy, like he'd forgotten to comb it.

"Wow that is a really nice description of your best friend Leo. Did I really look that bad?" Jason asked. "To be honest that description was putting it lightly. You actually looked a lot worse." He explained "Thanks..." Suddenly from the audience a voice shyly spoke up "Um... I have a question if you don't mind." She said and so I quickly answered before things got awkward "Ask away" "Um... What's a Praetor?" Jason answered for me as it was his title for longer than me. "It's the leader of Camp Jupiter and their are always two. I was the praetor back before I went missing and while I was gone they had a really huge battle and Percy got raised up on the shield afterwards by all the other campers making him the new praetor until he stepped down to give it back to me when I came back since he said he never wanted the title to begin with because he is just way to modest and I gave a battlefield promotion and stepped down later to give the title to Frank. Reyna is the other praetor and has been for years." "Thanks that explains a lot".

Leo glanced at the others around the table. Hazel was bleary-eyed, too, but of course she'd been up all night guiding the ship through the mountains. Her curly cinnamon-colored hair was tied back in a bandana, which gave her a commando look that Leo found kind of hot—and then immediately felt guilty about.

Next to her sat her boyfriend Frank Zhang, dressed in black workout pants and a Roman tourist T-shirt that said CIAO! (was that even a word?). Frank's old centurion badge was pinned to his shirt, despite the fact that the demigods of the Argo II were now Public Enemies Numbers 1 through 7 back at Camp Jupiter. His grim expression just reinforced his unfortunate resemblance to a sumo wrestler. Then there was Hazel's half brother, Nico di Angelo. Dang, that kid gave Leo the freaky-deakies. He sat back in his leather aviator jacket, his black T-shirt and jeans, that wicked silver skull ring on his finger, and the Stygian sword at his side. His tufts of black hair stuck up in curls like baby bat wings. His eyes were sad and kind of empty, as if he'd stared into the depths of Tartarus—which he had.

"Leo you really need to work on your descriptions because you literally just said everyone was weird and or creepy to their face." Piper commented making Leo blush like a tomato.

The only absent demigod was Piper, who was taking her turn at the helm with Coach Hedge, their satyr chaperone.

Leo wished Piper were here. She had a way of calming things down with that Aphrodite charm of hers. After his dreams last night, Leo could use some calm.

On the other hand, it was probably good she was above deck chaperoning their chaperone. Now that they were in the ancient lands, they had to be constantly on guard. Leo was nervous about letting Coach Hedge fly solo. The satyr was a little trigger-happy, and the helm had plenty of bright, dangerous buttons that could cause the picturesque Italian villages below them to go BOOM!

"Maybe you should have a better chaperone than because that defeats the whole purpose." My math teacher Mr. Lee said. "Oh he helped us out a lot actually and was very good at healing which was unfortunately needed a lot." Nico explained

Leo had zoned out so totally he didn't realize Jason was still talking.

"—the House of Hades," he was saying. "Nico?"

Nico sat forward. "I communed with the dead last night."

He just tossed that line out there, like he was saying he got a text from a buddy.

"But for me it is just like getting a text from a friend because it's totally normal" Nico said while we all just stared at him like he had gone insane or grown another head. "Just keep reading" He eventually said just to break the silence.

"I was able to learn more about what we'll face," Nico continued. "In ancient times, the House of Hades was a major site for Greek pilgrims. They would come to speak with the dead and honor their ancestors."

Leo frowned. "Sounds like Día de los Muertos. My Aunt Rosa took that stuff seriously."

He remembered being dragged by her to the local cemetery in Houston, where they'd clean up their relatives' gravesites and put out offerings of lemonade, cookies, and fresh marigolds. Aunt Rosa would force Leo to stay for a picnic, as if hanging out with dead people were good for his appetite.

Frank grunted. "Chinese have that, too—ancestor worship, sweeping the graves in the springtime." He glanced at Leo. "Your Aunt Rosa would've gotten along with my grandmother."

"I can see that" Percy and Hazel both said at the same time causing them to look at each other before they both just started laughing.

Leo had a terrifying image of his Aunt Rosa and some old Chinese woman in wrestlers' outfits, whaling on each other with spiked clubs.

"Hey Frank's grandmother is really nice Leo and you shouldn't say things like that it's very rude" Hazel said scolding Leo like he was a child.

"Yeah," Leo said. "I'm sure they would've been best buds."

Nico cleared his throat. "A lot of cultures have seasonal traditions to honor the dead, but the House of Hades was open year-round. Pilgrims could actually speak to the ghosts. In Greek, the place was called the Necromanteion, the Oracle of Death. You'd work your way through different levels of tunnels, leaving offerings and drinking special potions—"

"Weren't those dug up and excavated before they concluded they weren't actually the real Necromanteion like 40 years ago?" Some nerd from the audience asked. ."Just listen and you will eventually get your answer." Frank said

"Special potions," Leo muttered. "Yum."

Jason flashed him a look like, Dude, enough. "Nico, go on."

"The pilgrims believed that each level of the temple brought you closer to the Underworld, until the dead would appear before you. If they were pleased with your offerings, they would answer your questions, maybe even tell you the future."

Frank tapped his mug of hot chocolate. "And if the spirits weren't pleased?"

"Some pilgrims found nothing," Nico said. "Some went insane, or died after leaving the temple. Others lost their way in the tunnels and were never seen again."

"The point is," Jason said quickly, "Nico found some information that might help us."

"Yeah." Nico didn't sound very enthusiastic. "The ghost I spoke to last night...he was a former priest of Hecate. He confirmed what the goddess told Hazel yesterday at the crossroads. In the first war with the giants, Hecate fought for the gods. She slew one of the giants—one who'd been designed as the anti-Hecate. A guy named Clytius."

"Dark dude," Leo guessed. "Wrapped in shadows."

Hazel turned toward him, her gold eyes narrowing. "Leo, how did you know that?"

"Kind of had a dream."

Leo shifted uncomfortably in his seat remembering the dream once again.

No one looked surprised. Most demigods had vivid nightmares about what was going on in the world.

His friends paid close attention as Leo explained. He tried not to look at the wall images of Camp Half-Blood as he described the place in ruins. He told them about the dark giant, and the strange woman on Half-Blood Hill, offering him a multiple-choice death.

Jason pushed away his plate of pancakes. "So the giant is Clytius. I suppose he'll be waiting for us, guarding the Doors of Death."

Frank rolled up one of the pancakes and started munching—not a guy to let impending death stand in the way of a hearty breakfast. "And the woman in Leo's dream?"

"She's my problem." Hazel passed a diamond between her fingers in a sleight of hand. "Hecate mentioned a formidable enemy in the House of Hades—a witch who couldn't be defeated except by me, using magic."

"Wait she knows magic?" Lucy asked from the back "No I didn't than but I have since learned how to."

"Do you know magic?" Leo asked.

"Not yet."

"Ah." He tried to think of something hopeful to say, but he recalled the angry woman's eyes, the way her steely grip made his skin smoke. "Any idea who she is?"

Hazel shook her head. "Only that..." She glanced at Nico, and some sort of silent argument happened between them. Leo got the feeling that the two of them had had private conversations about the House of Hades, and they weren't sharing all the details. "Only that she won't be easy to defeat."

"But there is some good news," Nico said. "The ghost I talked to explained how Hecate defeated Clytius in the first war. She used her torches to set his hair on fire. He burned to death. In other words, fire is his weakness."

Everybody looked at Leo.

"Oh," he said. "Okay."

Jason nodded encouragingly, like this was great news—like he expected Leo to walk up to a towering mass of darkness, shoot a few fireballs, and solve all their problems. Leo didn't want to bring him down, but he could still hear Gaea's voice: He is the void that consumes all magic, the cold that consumes all fire, the silence that consumes all speech.

Leo was pretty sure it would take more than a few matches to set that giant ablaze.

"It's a good lead," Jason insisted. "At least we know how to kill the giant. And this sorceress...well, if Hecate believes Hazel can defeat her, then so do I."

Hazel dropped her eyes. "Now we just have to reach the House of Hades, battle our way through Gaea's forces—"

"Plus a bunch of ghosts," Nico added grimly. "The spirits in that temple may not be friendly."

"—and find the Doors of Death," Hazel continued. "Assuming we can somehow arrive at the same time as Percy and Annabeth and rescue them."

Frank swallowed a bite of pancake. "We can do it. We have to."

Leo admired the big guy's optimism. He wished he shared it.

"Leo you should have said something and maybe we could have helped you see the positive side because we all know that thinking negatively always gets someone hurt." Piper said giving Leo a big hug.

"So, with this detour," Leo said, "I'm estimating four or five days to arrive at Epirus, assuming no delays for, you know, monster attacks and stuff."

Jason smiled sourly. "Yeah. Those never happen."

Leo looked at Hazel. "Hecate told you that Gaea was planning her big Wake Up party on August first, right? The Feast of Whatever?"

"Spes," Hazel said. "The goddess of hope."

Jason turned his fork. "Theoretically, that leaves us enough time. It's only July fifth. We should be able to close the Doors of Death, then find the giants' HQ and stop them from waking Gaea before August first."

"Theoretically," Hazel agreed. "But I'd still like to know how we make our way through the House of Hades without going insane or dying."

Nobody volunteered any ideas.

Frank set down his pancake roll like it suddenly didn't taste so good. "It's July fifth. Oh, jeez, I hadn't even thought of that...."

"Hey, man, it's cool," Leo said. "You're Canadian, right? I didn't expect you to get me an Independence Day present or anything...unless you wanted to."

"It's not that. My grandmother...she always told me that seven was an unlucky number. It was a ghost number. She didn't like it when I told her there would be seven demigods on our quest. And July is the seventh month."

"Yeah, but..." Leo tapped his fingers nervously on the table. He realized he was doing the Morse code for I love you, the way he used to do with his mom, which would have been pretty embarrassing if his friends understood Morse code. "But that's just coincidence, right?"

All the demigods started to laugh at Leo making him once again start blushing like a tomato.

Frank's expression didn't reassure him.

"Back in China," Frank said, "in the old days, people called the seventh month the ghost month. That's when the spirit world and the human world were closest. The living and the dead could go back and forth. Tell me it's a coincidence we're searching for the Doors of Death during the ghost month."

No one spoke.

Leo wanted to think that an old Chinese belief couldn't have anything to do with the Romans and the Greeks. Totally different, right? But Frank's existence was proof that the cultures were tied together. The Zhang family went all the way back to Ancient Greece. They'd found their way through Rome and China and finally to Canada.

Also, Leo kept thinking about his meeting with the revenge goddess Nemesis at the Great Salt Lake. Nemesis had called him the seventh wheel, the odd man out on the quest. She didn't mean seventh as in ghost, did she?

"Unfortunately she did but of course not even death can stop you!" Jason said cheerfully causing Leo to stick up his chest proudly and just further confusing the mortals.

Jason pressed his hands against the arms of his chair. "Let's focus on the things we can deal with. We're getting close to Bologna. Maybe we'll get more answers once we find these dwarfs that Hecate—"

The ship lurched as if it had hit an iceberg. Leo's breakfast plate slid across the table. Nico fell backward out of his chair and banged his head against the sideboard. He collapsed on the floor, with a dozen magic goblets and platters crashing down on top of him.

"Nico!" Hazel ran to help him.

"What—?" Frank tried to stand, but the ship pitched in the other direction. He stumbled into the table and went face-first into Leo's plate of scrambled eggs.

"Look!" Jason pointed at the walls. The images of Camp Half-Blood were flickering and changing.

"Not possible," Leo murmured.

"Leo in our world anything is possible and when we are involved nothing is impossible" Annabeth explained to Leo

No way those enchantments could show anything other than scenes from camp, but suddenly a huge, distorted face filled the entire port-side wall: crooked yellow teeth, a scraggly red beard, a warty nose, and two mismatched eyes—one much larger and higher than the other. The face seemed to be trying to eat its way into the room.

All the mortals looked disgusted at the description and the demigods just shrugged because they had seen weirder things.

The other walls flickered, showing scenes from above deck. Piper stood at the helm, but something was wrong. From the shoulders down she was wrapped in duct tape, her mouth gagged and her legs bound to the control console.

At the mainmast, Coach Hedge was similarly bound and gagged, while a bizarre-looking creature—a sort of gnome/chimpanzee combo with poor fashion sense—danced around him, doing the coach's hair in tiny pigtails with pink rubber bands.

"OH I CAN'T BELIEVE I MISSED SOMETHING THAT FUNNY!" I said laughing at the mental image.

On the port-side wall, the huge ugly face receded so that Leo could see the entire creature—another gnome chimp, in even crazier clothes. This one began leaping around the deck, stuffing things in a burlap bag—Piper's dagger, Leo's Wii controllers. Then he pried the Archimedes sphere out of the command console.

"No!" Leo yelled.

"Uhhh," Nico groaned from the floor.

"Piper!" Jason cried.

"Monkey!" Frank yelled.

"Not monkeys," Hazel grumbled. "I think those are dwarfs."

"Stealing my stuff!" Leo yelled, and he ran for the stairs.

'Ok that's the end of the chapter who wants to read next?"


	12. My friends meet Annabeth

"Why don't we take a break before we read the next chapter. We should let the mortals and demigods eat and talk to their friends." Demeter said before turning to the demigods who were nodding. I stood up and grabbed Annabeth's hand and started to drag her over to my mortal friends. "Hey" I yelled when I had almost reached them. They each gave me a big hug before I got them to release me. I pushed Annabeth who before had just been standing behind me awkwardly forward. "This is my girlfriend that I told you about." I said excitedly "Hi my name is Annabeth Chase daughter of Athena." she introduced herself. Than my friends started back on where we left off asking me tons of questions before the assembly.

"So your really a demigod a child of one of the gods?" Serena asked quietly. "Um... Yeah my dad is actually Poseidon the god of the sea and I didn't even know my dad was even still alive til I found out I was a demigod when I was 12." I explained while they were all staring at me curiously. "Can you tell us how you found out" Lucy asked nervously "Sure! Why not, so when I was 12 I was in 6th grade at a school called Yancy academy. I never really had any friends besides my best friend Grover who I didn't know was actually a Satyr and he eventually was the one who brought me to camp." I started.

"I was always either bullied or the one who protected the people who got bullied so one day we went on a field trip to a museum and one of bullies Nancy Bobofit was throwing Ketchup and Peanut butter sandwich at Grover and I guess I just snapped and had enough. That was the first time I used my powers even if I didn't know it back than." I said and they gasped. "What did you do?" Jake asks me begging me to continue the story. "I threw her in the fountain but I didn't actually see it happen but apparently the water grabbed her." I said proudly.

Continuing on my voice darkened "I didn't know it than but there was a monster in my school waiting for me to prove I was a demigod so she could kill me." Again my friends gasped but I could tell they were all really worried for me. "My math teacher Ms. Dodds told me to follow her and I thought she was going to make me get Nancy some new clothes from the gift shop but that didn't turn out to be the plan. She turned into a Fury and attacked me." I smiled looking at Annabeth thinking about our close escape from the Furies on the bus during our first quest. She seemed to know what I was thinking and smiled back. "I also didn't know that my Latin teacher was actually the famous teacher of demigods Chiron in disguise. He appeared out of nowhere and threw me a pen that turned into a sword and I did the natural thing and swung it killing the Fury." I said while all my friends looked at me like I was insane or something before Serena yelled "That is soooo COOL!" I laughed. "I thought I was going insane because afterwards Chiron had used the mist and no one else knew Ms. Dodds had ever existed. Grover was still being suspicious though because I already figured out that he was a pretty bad liar so I would catch him off guard every once in a while and ask him if Ms. Dodds existed and he hesitated so I knew something was up. I also caught Chiron and Grover talking about me and something that had to do with my first quest though we didn't know it was mine at first. I got kicked out of that school and that made it a new record of 6 schools in 6 years."

"After the school year was over I was on the bus home with Grover and the bus broke down. Across the street were these 3 old ladies knitting some socks and they totally freaked Grover out especially when they cut the string. I didn't know until later but those were the fates and when they cut the string that means you die" All of my friends were looking at me like how are you alive. "Turns out that wasn't my life string but it was someone I was about to meet and become friends with" I said sadly while all my friends looked at me with pity. Annabeth squeezed my hand tightly obviously still thinking about Luke. I squeezed back and whispered though I am sure all of us heard it "Luke died a Hero."

"After that I went home after ditching Grover because he was really freaking me out because the fates cut that string. I saw my mom and we went out to Montauk beach which is where we went every summer because it was the place my mom had met Poseidon. While we were there I had my first demigod dream and a hurricane suddenly blew in. Grover found me and that is when I learned he wasn't human and that the Minotaur had found me so my mom, who knew I was a demigod packed us in the car and drove me through a hurricane to Camp Half Blood which is now my home. My dad had told her before he left that that would be the only safe place for me once I realized who I was. The Minotaur was chasing us and all of a sudden lightning struck our car (Zeus) and it exploded. Fortunately we were all mostly ok but Grover was unconscious so I had to carry him to the camp borders that it wouldn't be able to cross. Unfortunately my mom was also no able to cross because she isn't a halfblood. I said I wouldn't cross without her so I ended up fighting the Minotaur weaponless in a hurricane. My mom was squeezed to death by the Minotaur before I could stop it but I later learned that she was just kidnapped by Hades."

"I defeated the Minotaur by breaking off it's horn and stabbing it with it. I then dragged Grover into camp and collapsed. The last thing I saw was Annabeth looking down at me. She healed me up and explained the whole Greek Mythology is real thing and met my girlfriend and I was sent on my first quest about a week later with Annabeth and Grover." I said slightly out of breath from the long story. "Oh wait I forgot to mention that when me and Annabeth met she absolutely HATED me." I said cheerfully. Ending my story for real this time. Zeus then called the break over and we got settled down to start the next chapter. I snuggled into Annabeth and we began.


	13. Leo XI

LEO WAS VAGUELY AWARE OF HAZEL SHOUTING, “Go! I’ll take care of Nico!”

As if Leo was going to turn back. Sure, he hoped di Angelo was okay, but he had headaches of his own.

“Wow, I’m totally feeling the love over here” Nico commented sarcastically to Leo who just glared at him before retorting “Well I’m sorry that Piper and all of our dangerous weapons were in danger and been stolen.”

Leo bounded up the steps, with Jason and Frank behind him.

The situation on deck was even worse than he’d feared.

Coach Hedge and Piper were struggling against their duct tape bonds while one of the demon monkey dwarfs danced around the deck, picking up whatever wasn’t tied down and sticking it in his bag. He was maybe four feet tall, even shorter than Coach Hedge, with bowed legs and chimp-like feet, his clothes so loud they gave Leo vertigo. His green-plaid pants were pinned at the cuffs, and held up with bright-red suspenders over a striped pink-and-black woman’s blouse. He wore half a dozen gold watches on each arm, and a zebra-patterned cowboy hat with a price tag dangling from the brim. His skin was covered with patches of scraggly red fur, though ninety percent of his body hair seemed to be concentrated in his magnificent eyebrows.

Leo was just forming the thought Where’s the other dwarf? when he heard a click behind him and realized he’d led his friends into a trap.

“You guys should think things through before you just jump in a situation that could be potentially very dangerous” Reyna said helpfully while the 7 and Nico just glared at her playfully.

“Duck!” He hit the deck as the explosion blasted his eardrums.

Note to self, Leo thought groggily. Do not leave boxes of magic grenades where dwarfs can reach them.

Everyone just busted out laughing at this even the teachers because it was just too funny.

At least he was alive. Leo had been experimenting with all sorts of weapons based on the Archimedes sphere that he’d recovered in Rome. He’d built grenades that could spray acid, fire, shrapnel, or freshly buttered popcorn. (Hey, you never knew when you’d get hungry in battle.) Judging from the ringing in Leo’s ears, the dwarf had detonated the flash-bang grenade, which Leo had filled with a rare vial of Apollo’s music, pure liquid extract. It didn’t kill, but it left Leo feeling like he’d just done a belly flop off the deep end.

“Wait you mean that Archimedes from way back in Ancient Greece! No way people have been after his invention secrets for thousands of years!” A mortal said and was bouncing in excitement. “Well I discovered his secret workshop underground while Frank, Hazel and I were on a quest under Rome. It really was cool but I didn’t really have time to look around because we were being chased by those stupid eidolons possessing dummies and were attacking us and I had to grab some of scrolls and use some old inventions to save Hazel and Frank and get us out alive. And Queen dirt face was messing with our heads too by showing us what the others were doing which at the time was not he best and I saved them and we escaped and here we are.” Leo explained 

He tried to get up. His limbs were useless. Someone was tugging at his waist, maybe a friend trying to help him up? No. His friends didn’t smell like heavily perfumed monkey cages.

He managed to turn over. His vision was out of focus and tinted pink, like the world had been submerged in strawberry jelly. A grinning, grotesque face loomed over him. The brown-furred dwarf was dressed even worse than his friend, in a green bowler hat like a leprechaun’s, dangly diamond earrings, and a white-and-black referee’s shirt. He showed off the prize he’d just stolen—Leo’s tool belt—then danced away.

“I am still mad about that! I mean who steals your tool belt!” Leo shouted indignantly 

Leo tried to grab him, but his fingers were numb. The dwarf frolicked over to the nearest ballista, which his red-furred friend was priming to launch.

The brown-furred dwarf jumped onto the projectile like it was a skateboard, and his friend shot him into the sky.

Red Fur pranced over to Coach Hedge. He gave the satyr a big smack on the cheek, then skipped to the rail. He bowed to Leo, doffing his zebra cowboy hat, and did a backflip over the side.

“Hey are those the same dwarfs that were stealing our stuff when we were on our way to Camp Half Blood to fight the greeks?” Reyna asked suspiciously. “Um... Well you see... I sent them after we got our stuff back to slow you down and by the sound of it our plan worked” Leo said cautiously.

Leo managed to get up. Jason was already on his feet, stumbling and running into things. Frank had turned into a silverback gorilla (why, Leo wasn’t sure; maybe to commune with the monkey dwarfs?) but the flash grenade had hit him hard. He was sprawled on the deck with his tongue hanging out and his gorilla eyes rolled up in his head.

“Piper!” Jason staggered to the helm and carefully pulled the gag out of her mouth.

“Don’t waste your time on me!” she said. “Go after them!”

At the mast, Coach Hedge mumbled, “HHHmmmmm-hmmm!”

Leo figured that meant: “KILL THEM!” Easy translation, since most of the coach’s sentences involved the word kill.

“You guys seriously need a new chaperone he just isn’t safe to be around.” Mr. Lee said again while we all just shrugged.

Leo glanced at the control console. His Archimedes sphere was gone. He put his hand to his waist, where his tool belt should have been. His head started to clear, and his sense of outrage came to a boil. Those dwarfs had attacked his ship. They’d stolen his most precious possessions.

“Oh Leo’s mad now!” I said leaning in to him and nudging him with my elbow.

Below him spread the city of Bologna—a jigsaw puzzle of red-tiled buildings in a valley hemmed by green hills. Unless Leo could find the dwarfs somewhere in that maze of streets…Nope. Failure wasn’t an option. Neither was waiting for his friends to recover.

He turned to Jason. “You feeling good enough to control the winds? I need a lift.”

Jason frowned. “Sure, but—”

“Good,” Leo said. “We’ve got some monkey dudes to catch.”

Jason and Leo touched down in a big piazza lined with white marble government buildings and outdoor cafés. Bikes and Vespas clogged the surrounding streets, but the square itself was empty except for pigeons and a few old men drinking espresso.

None of the locals seemed to notice the huge Greek warship hovering over the piazza, or the fact that Jason and Leo had just flown down, Jason wielding a gold sword, and Leo…well, Leo pretty much empty-handed.

“So you carry your weapons in your toolbelt than?” Jake asked Leo curiously “Yep it's got all I need”Leo stated proudly.

“Where to?” Jason asked.

Leo stared at him. “Well, I dunno. Let me pull my dwarf-tracking GPS out of my tool belt.… Oh, wait! I don’t have a dwarf-tracking GPS—or my tool belt!”

“Fine,” Jason grumbled. He glanced up at the ship as if to get his bearings, then pointed across the piazza. “The ballista fired the first dwarf in that direction, I think. Come on.”

They waded through a lake of pigeons, then maneuvered down a side street of clothing stores and gelato shops. The sidewalks were lined with white columns covered in graffiti. A few panhandlers asked for change (Leo didn’t know Italian, but he got the message loud and clear).

He kept patting his waist, hoping his tool belt would magically reappear. It didn’t. He tried not to freak, but he’d come to depend on that belt for almost everything. He felt like somebody had stolen one of his hands.

“We’ll find it,” Jason promised.

Usually, Leo would have felt reassured. Jason had a talent for staying levelheaded in a crisis, and he’d gotten Leo out of plenty of bad scrapes. Today, though, all Leo could think about was the stupid fortune cookie he had opened in Rome. The goddess Nemesis had promised him help, and he’d gotten it: the code to activate the Archimedes sphere. At the time, Leo had had no choice but to use it if he wanted to save his friends—but Nemesis had warned that her help came with a price.

Leo wondered if that price would ever be paid. Percy and Annabeth were gone. The ship was hundreds of miles off course, heading toward an impossible challenge. Leo’s friends were counting on him to beat a terrifying giant. And now he didn’t even have his tool belt or his Archimedes sphere.

“Leo stop blaming yourself! So what if we had a little bad luck that is the usual for us demigods. We always have bad luck you shouldn’t think so hard about it, it's just a factor of our life. Get over it!” Annabeth said to Leo seriously. 

He was so absorbed with feeling sorry for himself that he didn’t notice where they were until Jason grabbed his arm. “Check it out.”

Leo looked up. They’d arrived in a smaller piazza. Looming over them was a huge bronze statue of a buck-naked Neptune.

All the gods and demigods bust out laughing while Poseidon just blushed and tried to hide behind Hades again.

“Ah, jeez.” Leo averted his eyes. He really didn’t need to see a godly groin this early in the morning.

Percy just couldn’t help but laugh again at his dad and Poseidon was still trying to hide behind Hades to escape his laughing son.

The sea god stood on a big marble column in the middle of a fountain that wasn’t working (which seemed kind of ironic). On either side of Neptune, little winged Cupid dudes were sitting, kind of chillin’, like, What’s up? Neptune himself (avoid the groin) was throwing his hip to one side in an Elvis Presley move. He gripped his trident loosely in his right hand and stretched his left hand out like he was blessing Leo, or possibly attempting to levitate him.

Percy was still laughing his head off and Poseidon had given up hiding and was just blushing.

“Some kind of clue?” Leo wondered.

Jason frowned. “Maybe, maybe not. There are statues of the gods all over the place in Italy. I’d just feel better if we ran across Jupiter. Or Minerva. Anybody but Neptune, really.”

Leo climbed into the dry fountain. He put his hand on the statue’s pedestal, and a rush of impressions surged through his fingertips. He sensed Celestial bronze gears, magical levers, springs, and pistons.

“It’s mechanical,” he said. “Maybe a doorway to the dwarfs’ secret lair?”

“Ooooo!” shrieked a nearby voice. “Secret lair?”

“I want a secret lair!” yelled another voice from above.

“Oh my Gods that came out of nowhere!” A mortal yelled

Jason stepped back, his sword ready. Leo almost got whiplash trying to look in two places at once. The red-furred dwarf in the cowboy hat was sitting about thirty feet away at the nearest café table, sipping an espresso held by his monkey-like foot. The brown-furred dwarf in the green bowler was perched on the marble pedestal at Neptune’s feet, just above Leo’s head.

“If we had a secret lair,” said Red Fur, “I would want a firehouse pole.”

“And a waterslide!” said Brown Fur, who was pulling random tools out of Leo’s belt, tossing aside wrenches, hammers, and staple guns.

“Stop that!” Leo tried to grab the dwarf’s feet, but he couldn’t reach the top of the pedestal.

“Oh he better not say what I think he is going to say” Piper whispers to herself.

“Too short?” Brown Fur sympathized.

“Never insult Leo’s height!” Jason yelled.

“You’re calling me short?” Leo looked around for something to throw, but there was nothing but pigeons, and he doubted he could catch one. “Give me my belt, you stupid—”

“Now, now!” said Brown Fur. “We haven’t even introduced ourselves. I’m Akmon. And my brother over there—”

“—is the handsome one!” The red-furred dwarf lifted his espresso. Judging from his dilated eyes and his maniacal grin, he didn’t need any more caffeine. “Passalos! Singer of songs! Drinker of coffee! Stealer of shiny stuff!”

“Please!” shrieked his brother, Akmon. “I steal much better than you.”

“Is that really something to be proud of?” Lucy asked confused. “For them it is their life and they aren’t actually that bad really. They just had some bad influences but they did put it to good use sometimes.” Leo replied happily.

Passalos snorted. “Stealing naps, maybe!” He took out a knife—Piper’s knife—and started picking his teeth with it.

“Eww! You didn’t tell me he used it to pick his teeth with! Jason that is so gross! I need to disinfect it quick! LEO WHERE IS THE DISINFECTING SPRAY?!?!” Piper ranted completely grossed out while Leo just reached into his toolbelt and grabbed a can of the stuff and tossed it to her.

“Hey!” Jason yelled. “That’s my girlfriend’s knife!”

He lunged at Passalos, but the red-furred dwarf was too quick. He sprang from his chair, bounced off Jason’s head, did a flip, and landed next to Leo, his hairy arms around Leo’s waist.

“Save me?” the dwarf pleaded.

“Get off!” Leo tried to shove him away, but Passalos did a backward somersault and landed out of reach. Leo’s pants promptly fell around his knees.

We all start laughing once again and poor Leo turned the shade of a freshly painted fire hydrant. 

He stared at Passalos, who was now grinning and holding a small zigzaggy strip of metal. Somehow, the dwarf had stolen the zipper right off Leo’s pants.

We all seriously couldn't stop laughing at Leo’s misfortune in this chapter and Leo just looked like he wanted to die again.

“Give—stupid—zipper!” Leo stuttered, trying to shake his fist and hoist up his pants at the same time.

“Eh, not shiny enough.” Passalos tossed it away.

Jason lunged with his sword. Passalos launched himself straight up and was suddenly sitting on the statue’s pedestal next to his brother.

“Tell me I don’t have moves,” Passalos boasted.

“Okay,” Akmon said. “You don’t have moves.”

“Bah!” Passalos said. “Give me the tool belt. I want to see.”

“No!” Akmon elbowed him away. “You got the knife and the shiny ball.”

“Yes, the shiny ball is nice.” Passalos took off his cowboy hat. Like a magician producing a rabbit, he pulled out the Archimedes sphere and began tinkering with the ancient bronze dials.

“Stop!” Leo yelled. “That’s a delicate machine.”

“That is definitely not something they should be messing with because even Leo who knows how to work that thing has made one explode in his face before.” Reyna said while remembering the time she was on the Argo II waiting to leave with Nico and Coach Hedge.

Jason came to his side and glared up at the dwarfs. “Who are you two, anyway?”

“The Kerkopes!” Akmon narrowed his eyes at Jason. “I bet you’re a son of Jupiter, eh? I can always tell.”

“Just like Black Bottom,” Passalos agreed.

“I love that nickname because that like describes him perfectly!” Jason said laughing while everyone else besides Leo was wondering what he was talking about.

“Black Bottom?” Leo resisted the urge to jump at the dwarfs’ feet again. He was sure Passalos was going to ruin the Archimedes sphere any second now.

“Yes, you know.” Akmon grinned. “Hercules. We called him Black Bottom because he used to go around without clothes. He got so tan that his backside, well—”

Now we were all laughing while the mortals were still confused.

“At least he had a sense of humor!” Passalos said. “He was going to kill us when we stole from him, but he let us go because he liked our jokes. Not like you two. Grumpy, grumpy!”

“Hey, I’ve got a sense of humor,” Leo snarled. “Give me back our stuff, and I’ll tell you a joke with a good punch line.”

“Nice try!” Akmon pulled a ratchet wrench from the tool belt and spun it like a noisemaker. “Oh, very nice! I’m definitely keeping this! Thanks, Blue Bottom!”

Blue Bottom?

Now Piper was Laughing so hard at the nickname they gave Leo and Leo was over in a corner looking like he was slowly digging his own grave.

Leo glanced down. His pants had slipped around his ankles again, revealing his blue undershorts. “That’s it!” he shouted. “My stuff. Now. Or I’ll show you how funny a flaming dwarf is.”

His hands caught fire.

“Now we’re talking.” Jason thrust his sword into the sky. Dark clouds began to gather over the piazza. Thunder boomed.

“Oh, scary!” Akmon shrieked.

“Yes,” Passalos agreed. “If only we had a secret lair to hide in.”

“Alas, this statue isn’t the doorway to a secret lair,” Akmon said. “It has a different purpose.”

Leo’s gut twisted. The fires died in his hands, and he realized something was very wrong. He yelled, “Trap!” and dove out of the fountain. Unfortunately, Jason was too busy summoning his storm.

“Stupid net caused me to miss all the fun and action because it took so long for me to get out!” Jason said sadly.

Leo rolled on his back as five golden cords shot from the Neptune statue’s fingers. One barely missed Leo’s feet. The rest homed in on Jason, wrapping him like a rodeo calf and yanking him upside down.

A bolt of lightning blasted the tines of Neptune’s trident, sending arcs of electricity up and down the statue, but the Kerkopes had already disappeared.

“Bravo!” Akmon applauded from a nearby café table. “You make a wonderful piñata, son of Jupiter!”

“Yes!” Passalos agreed. “Hercules hung us upside down once, you know. Oh, revenge is sweet!”

Leo summoned a fireball. He lobbed it at Passalos, who was trying to juggle two pigeons and the Archimedes sphere.

“Eek!” The dwarf jumped free of the explosion, dropping the sphere and letting the pigeons fly.

“Time to leave!” Akmon decided.

He tipped his bowler and sprang away, jumping from table to table. Passalos glanced at the Archimedes sphere, which had rolled between Leo’s feet.

Leo summoned another fireball. “Try me,” he snarled.

“Hey at least you got the Archimedes sphere back” a mortal said.

“Bye!” Passalos did a backflip and ran after his brother.

Leo scooped up the Archimedes sphere and ran over to Jason, who was still hanging upside down, thoroughly hog-tied except for his sword arm. He was trying to cut the cords with his gold blade but having no luck.

“Hold on,” Leo said. “If I can find a release switch—”

“Just go!” Jason growled. “I’ll follow you when I get out of this.”

“But—”

“Don’t lose them!”

The last thing Leo wanted was some alone time with the monkey dwarfs, but the Kerkopes were already disappearing around the far corner of the piazza. Leo left Jason hanging and ran after them.

“You literally left me hanging man!” Jason cried.


	14. Leo XII

“I can read next” a mortal named David said.  
THE DWARFS DIDN’T TRY VERY HARD TO LOSE HIM, which made Leo suspicious. They stayed just at the edge of his vision, scampering over red-tiled rooftops, knocking over window boxes, whooping and hollering and leaving a trail of screws and nails from Leo’s tool belt—almost as if they wanted Leo to follow.

“That is not a good sign. Them wanting you to follow is just screaming trap” Frank commented.

He jogged after them, cursing every time his pants fell down. He turned a corner and saw two ancient stone towers jutting into the sky, side by side, much taller than anything else in the neighborhood—maybe medieval watchtowers? They leaned in different directions like gearshifts on a race car.

The Kerkopes scaled the tower on the right. When they reached the top, they climbed around the back and disappeared.

Had they gone inside? Leo could see some tiny windows at the top, covered with metal grates; but he doubted those would stop the dwarfs. He watched for a minute, but the Kerkopes didn’t reappear. Which meant Leo had to get up there and look for them.

“Great,” he muttered. No flying friend to carry him up. The ship was too far away to call for help. He could jury-rig the Archimedes sphere into some sort of flying device, maybe, but only if he had his tool belt—which he didn’t. He scanned the neighborhood, trying to think. Half a block down, a set of double glass doors opened and an old lady hobbled out, carrying plastic shopping bags.

“Wow a store how convenient for Leo who can basically build anything he wants out of random junk. Just hope you have money that works in Italy.” I said sarcastically 

A grocery store? Hmm…

Leo patted his pockets. To his amazement, he still had some euro notes from his time in Rome. Those stupid dwarfs had taken everything except his money.

 

“Usually when you get robbed they will only take the money or sometimes take so items but lucky you.” Hera said scowling at the demigods good luck.

He ran for the store as fast as his zipperless pants allowed.

Hermes and Apollo who had been struggling to not burst out laughing at Leo for a while now just couldn’t hold it in anymore and so poor Leo was once again a latino elf strawberry.

Leo scoured the aisles, looking for things he could use. He didn’t know the Italian for Hello, where are your dangerous chemicals, please? But that was probably just as well. He didn’t want to end up in an Italian jail.

Fortunately, he didn’t need to read labels. He could tell just from picking up a toothpaste tube whether it contained potassium nitrate. He found charcoal. He found sugar and baking soda. The store sold matches, and bug spray, and aluminum foil. Pretty much everything he needed, plus a laundry cord he could use as a belt. He added some Italian junk food to the basket, just to sort of disguise his more suspicious purchases, then dumped his stuff at the register. A wide-eyed checkout lady asked him some questions he didn’t understand, but he managed to pay, get a bag, and race out.

“Told you it was just random junk. How do you even make anything out of that Leo?” I asked him and he just smirked at me.

He ducked into the nearest doorway where he could keep an eye on the towers. He started to work, summoning fire to dry out materials and do a little cooking that otherwise would have taken days to complete.

Every once in a while he sneaked a look at the tower, but there was no sign of the dwarfs. Leo could only hope they were still up there. Making his arsenal took just a few minutes—he was that good—but it felt like hours.

“Stupid ADHD” all the demigods except Frank mumbled and the mortals were once again confused.

Jason didn’t show. Maybe he was still tangled at the Neptune fountain, or scouring the streets looking for Leo. No one else from the ship came to help. Probably it was taking them a long time to get all those pink rubber bands out of Coach Hedge’s hair.

Suddenly Coach Hedge appeared out of nowhere and we all just stared at him and he just stared back until the Gods spoke up. “We thought he should be here to listen to the book as well as he shared this adventure with you.” We all nodded in understanding but Coach hedge was still looking confused so we explained the situation to him. “Hi, I am Coach Hedge and I am a satyr but I was these cupcakes chaperone on this long quest.” All the mortals said hi and so we continued reading. 

That meant Leo had only himself, his bag of junk food, and a few highly improvised weapons made from sugar and toothpaste. Oh, and the Archimedes sphere. That was kind of important. He hoped he hadn’t ruined it by filling it with chemical powder.

“Um no offence Leo but that will probably raise the probability of it exploding in your face” Annabeth commented

He ran to the tower and found the entrance. He started up the winding stairs inside, only to be stopped at a ticket booth by some caretaker who yelled at him in Italian.

“Seriously?” Leo asked. “Look, man, you’ve got dwarfs in your belfry. I’m the exterminator.” He held up his can of bug spray. “See? Exterminator Molto Buono. Squirt, squirt. Ahhh!” He pantomimed a dwarf melting in terror, which for some reason the Italian didn’t seem to understand.

“I don’t think anyone would have understood that Leo” Piper said

The guy just held out his palm for money.

“Dang, man,” Leo grumbled, “I just spent all my cash on homemade explosives and whatnot.” He dug around in his grocery bag. “Don’t suppose you’d accept…uh…whatever these are?”

Leo held up a yellow-and-red bag of junk food called Fonzies. He assumed they were some kind of chips. To his surprise, the caretaker shrugged and took the bag. “Avanti!”

“Those stupid things! After you got back you were obsessed!” Hazel said angrily.

Leo kept climbing, but he made a mental note to stock up on Fonzies. Apparently they were better than cash in Italy.

The stairs went on, and on, and on. The whole tower seemed to be nothing but an excuse to build a staircase.

He stopped on a landing and slumped against a narrow barred window, trying to catch his breath. He was sweating like crazy, and his heart thumped against his ribs. Stupid Kerkopes. Leo figured that as soon as he reached the top, they would jump away before he could use his weapons; but he had to try.

He kept climbing.

Finally, his legs feeling like overcooked noodles, he reached the summit.

Leo you should do more training for stamina. I can help you with that next time I’ at camp if you want?” I asked Leo who looked grateful “Yeah but maybe next time I get chosen for a quest it won't be right after I get to camp giving me no time to train” Leo said. “I feel you there man” I said remembering my first quest when I was only twelve.

The room was about the size of a broom closet, with barred windows on all four walls. Shoved in the corners were sacks of treasure, shiny goodies spilling all over the floor. Leo spotted Piper’s knife, an old leather-bound book, a few interesting-looking mechanical devices, and enough gold to give Hazel’s horse a stomachache.

At first, he thought the dwarfs had left. Then he looked up. Akmon and Passalos were hanging upside down from the rafters by their chimp feet, playing antigravity poker. When they saw Leo, they threw their cards like confetti and broke out in applause.

“I told you he’d do it!” Akmon shrieked in delight.

Passalos shrugged and took off one of his gold watches and handed it to his brother. “You win. I didn’t think he was that dumb.”

They both dropped to the floor. Akmon was wearing Leo’s tool belt—he was so close that Leo had to resist the urge to lunge for it.

Passalos straightened his cowboy hat and kicked open the grate on the nearest window. “What should we make him climb next, brother? The dome of San Luca?”

Leo wanted to throttle the dwarfs, but he forced a smile. “Oh, that sounds fun! But before you guys go, you forgot something shiny.”

“Why are you baiting them? That sounds like it's a really stupid idea right now” Jake said from the audience. “Um... Most of our plans sound stupid at first to be honest but they usually work out well in the end.” Leo explained to Jake while rubbing the back of his neck.

“Impossible!” Akmon scowled. “We were very thorough.”

“You sure?” Leo held up his grocery bag.

The dwarfs inched closer. As Leo had hoped, their curiosity was so strong that they couldn’t resist.

“Look.” Leo brought out his first weapon—a lump of dried chemicals wrapped in aluminum foil—and lit it with his hand.

He knew enough to turn away when it popped, but the dwarfs were staring right at it. Toothpaste, sugar, and bug spray weren’t as good as Apollo’s music, but they made for a pretty decent flash-bang.

“Wow that is actually really cool” My art teacher commented thoughtfully from where she was sitting with the rest of the teachers.

The Kerkopes wailed, clawing at their eyes. They stumbled toward the window, but Leo set off his homemade firecrackers—snapping them around the dwarfs’ bare feet to keep them off balance. Then, for good measure, Leo turned the dial on his Archimedes sphere, which unleashed a plume of foul white fog that filled the room.

Leo wasn’t bothered by smoke. Being immune to fire, he’d stood in smoky bonfires, endured dragon breath, and cleaned out blazing forges plenty of times. While the dwarfs were hacking and wheezing, he grabbed his tool belt from Akmon, calmly summoned some bungee cords, and tied up the dwarfs.

“My eyes!” Akmon coughed. “My tool belt!”

“My feet are on fire!” Passalos wailed. “Not shiny! Not shiny at all!”

All the demigods had busted out laughing at how Leo had defeated the dwarfs and thinking about how that was the perfect Leo like thing to do.

After making sure they were securely bound, Leo dragged the Kerkopes into one corner and began rifling through their treasures. He retrieved Piper’s dagger, a few of his prototype grenades, and a dozen other odds and ends the dwarfs had taken from the Argo II.

“Please!” Akmon wailed. “Don’t take our shinies!”

“We’ll make you a deal!” Passalos suggested. “We’ll cut you in for ten percent if you let us go!”

“10% isn’t really a good deal” Annabeth said dryly.

“Afraid not,” Leo muttered. “It’s all mine now.”

“Twenty percent!”

“That's not much better” Piper added.

Just then, thunder boomed overhead. Lightning flashed, and the bars on the nearest window burst into sizzling, melted stubs of iron.

Jason flew in like Peter Pan, electricity sparking around him and his gold sword steaming.

“Jason you so wasted that cool entrance by missing all the action!” I laugh at Jason who is just pouting next the Piper while she is comforting her pouting Boyfriend.

Leo whistled appreciatively. “Man, you just wasted an awesome entrance.”

Jason frowned. He noticed the hog-tied Kerkopes. “What the—”

“Poor Jason” Frank commented looking at Jason who snuggled closer to Piper

“All by myself,” Leo said. “I’m special that way. How did you find me?”

“Uh, the smoke,” Jason managed. “And I heard popping noises. Were you having a gunfight in here?”

“Leo with a gun is maybe worse that Leo with those sphere’s” Hazel said

“Something like that.” Leo tossed him Piper’s dagger, then kept rummaging through the bags of dwarf shinies. He remembered what Hazel had said about finding a treasure that would help them with the quest, but he wasn’t sure what he was looking for. There were coins, gold nuggets, jewelry, paper clips, foil wrappers, cuff links.

He kept coming back to a couple of things that didn’t seem to belong. One was an old bronze navigation device, like an astrolabe from a ship. It was badly damaged and seemed to be missing some pieces, but Leo still found it fascinating.

“Take it!” Passalos offered. “Odysseus made it, you know! Take it and let us go.”

“Odysseus?” Jason asked. “Like, the Odysseus?”

“Look guys Nobody is mentioned once again.” I said looking at Annabeth who instantly blushed remembering her playing as Nobody to escape Polyphemus's island. All the other demigods and mortals looked very confused at our reactions.

“Yes!” Passalos squeaked. “Made it when he was an old man in Ithaca. One of his last inventions, and we stole it!”

“How does it work?” Leo asked.

“Oh, it doesn’t,” Akmon said. “Something about a missing crystal?” He glanced at his brother for help.

“‘My biggest what-if,’” Passalos said. “‘Should’ve taken a crystal.’ That’s what he kept muttering in his sleep, the night we stole it.” Passalos shrugged. “No idea what he meant. But the shiny is yours! Can we go now?”

Leo wasn’t sure why he wanted the astrolabe. It was obviously broken, and he didn’t get the sense that this was what Hecate meant for them to find. Still, he slipped it into one of his tool belt’s magic pockets.

“That’s the Astrolabe that helped me get back to my girlfriends island that no man can ever return to twice except for me obviously.” Leo stated proudly.

He turned his attention to the other strange piece of loot—the leather-bound book. Its title was in gold leaf, in a language Leo couldn’t understand, but nothing else about the book seemed shiny. He didn’t figure the Kerkopes for big readers.

“What’s this?” He wagged it at the dwarfs, who were still teary-eyed from the smoke.

“Nothing!” Akmon said. “Just a book. It had a pretty gold cover, so we took it from him.”

“Him?” Leo asked.

Akmon and Passalos exchanged a nervous look.

“Minor god,” Passalos said. “In Venice. Really, it’s nothing.”

“Venice.” Jason frowned at Leo. “Isn’t that where we’re supposed to go next?”

“Yeah.” Leo examined the book. He couldn’t read the text, but it had lots of illustrations: scythes, different plants, a picture of the sun, a team of oxen pulling a cart. He didn’t see how any of that was important, but if the book had been stolen from a minor god in Venice—the next place Hecate had told them to visit—then this had to be what they were looking for.

“Where exactly can we find this minor god?” Leo asked.

“Was that when we found out we had to vist Trip? I still need to get back at him for turning me into a corn plant. I still have nightmares about Popcorn!” Nico said angry.

“No!” Akmon shrieked. “You can’t take it back to him! If he finds out we stole it—”

“He’ll destroy you,” Jason guessed. “Which is what we’ll do if you don’t tell us, and we’re a lot closer.” He pressed the point of his sword against Akmon’s furry throat.

“Okay, okay!” the dwarf shrieked. “La Casa Nera! Calle Frezzeria!”

“Is that an address?” Leo asked.

The dwarfs both nodded vigorously.

“Please don’t tell him we stole it,” Passalos begged. “He isn’t nice at all!”

“Who is he?” Jason asked. “What god?”

“I—I can’t say,” Passalos stammered.

“You’d better,” Leo warned.

“No,” Passalos said miserably. “I mean, I really can’t say. I can’t pronounce it! Tr—tri—It’s too hard!”

“Truh,” Akmon said. “Tru-toh—Too many syllables!”

They both burst into tears.

“Wow they have some major issues” I said 

Leo didn’t know if the Kerkopes were telling them the truth, but it was hard to stay mad at weeping dwarfs, no matter how annoying and badly dressed they were.

“I wouldn’t have a problem especially when they stole my stuff” Reyna said stiffly while we just rolled our eyes.

Jason lowered his sword. “What do you want to do with them, Leo? Send them to Tartarus?”

“Please, no!” Akmon wailed. “It might take us weeks to come back.”

“Assuming Gaea even lets us!” Passalos sniffled. “She controls the Doors of Death now. She’ll be very cross with us.”

Me and Annabeth shivered at the thought of Tartarus and The Doors of Death while all of our friends looked at us sadly.

Leo looked at the dwarfs. He’d fought lots of monsters before and never felt bad about dissolving them, but this was different. He had to admit he sort of admired these little guys. They played cool pranks and liked shiny things. Leo could relate. Besides, Percy and Annabeth were in Tartarus right now, hopefully still alive, trudging toward the Doors of Death. The idea of sending these twin monkey boys there to face the same nightmarish problem…well, it didn’t seem right.

He imagined Gaea laughing at his weakness—a demigod too softhearted to kill monsters. He remembered his dream about Camp Half-Blood in ruins, Greek and Roman bodies littering the fields. He remembered Octavian speaking with the Earth Goddess’s voice: The Romans move east from New York. They advance on your camp, and nothing can slow them down.

“When Octavian is in control and has a motive almost nothing can prevent that from coming to pass” Reyna said in an annoyed voice

“Nothing can slow them down,” Leo mused. “I wonder…”

“What?” Jason asked.

Leo looked at the dwarfs. “I’ll make you a deal.”

Akmon’s eyes lit up. “Thirty percent?”

“We’ll leave you all your treasure,” Leo said, “except the stuff that belongs to us, and the astrolabe, and this book, which we’ll take back to the dude in Venice.”

“But he’ll destroy us!” Passalos wailed.

“We won’t say where we got it,” Leo promised. “And we won’t kill you. We’ll let you go free.”

“That doesn't sound like a good idea” Lucy said 

“Uh, Leo…?” Jason asked nervously.

Akmon squealed with delight. “I knew you were as smart as Hercules! I will call you Black Bottom, the Sequel!”

“Yeah, no thanks,” Leo said. “But in return for us sparing your lives, you have to do something for us. I’m going to send you somewhere to steal from some people, harass them, make life hard for them any way you can. You have to follow my directions exactly. You have to swear on the River Styx.”

“We swear!” Passalos said. “Stealing from people is our specialty!”

“I love harassment!” Akmon agreed. “Where are we going?”

Leo grinned. “Ever heard of New York?”

“So that's how we ended up with annoying dwarfs stealing all our stuff and harassing the legionnaires” Reyna summing up the events.

“Ok I’m done reading the chapter now who wants to read next?”


	15. Percy XIII

“I’ll read next.” Paul said taking the book.  
PERCY HAD TAKEN HIS GIRLFRIEND on some romantic walks before. This wasn’t one of them.  
All the demigods burst out laughing except Annabeth and a blushing Percy who was being glared at by Annabeth’s mom Athena.  
They followed the River Phlegethon, stumbling over the glassy black terrain, jumping crevices, and hiding behind rocks whenever the vampire girls slowed in front of them.  
“Oh yeah you guys were following some monsters who were heading to the doors so they could escape to that surface of the earth.” Hazel said remembering the earlier chapters in Annabeth’s point of view.  
It was tricky to stay far enough back to avoid getting spotted but close enough to keep Kelli and her comrades in view through the dark hazy air. The heat from the river baked Percy’s skin. Every breath was like inhaling sulfur-scented fiberglass. When they needed a drink, the best they could do was sip some refreshing liquid fire.  
“Ugh! GROSS!” Aphrodite said disgusted.  
Yep. Percy definitely knew how to show a girl a good time.  
Percy had snuggled closer to Annabeth and she was stroking his hair comfortingly because she knew he hated being the center of attention and that would be happening a lot since this chapter was in his point of view.  
At least Annabeth’s ankle seemed to have healed. She was hardly limping at all. Her various cuts and scrapes had faded. She’d tied her blond hair back with a strip of denim torn from her pants leg, and in the fiery light of the river, her gray eyes flickered. Despite being beat-up, sooty, and dressed like a homeless person, she looked great to Percy.  
Annabeth blushed when Piper and her mom Aphrodite squealed at the cuteness until Jason told Piper that her Aphrodite was showing again.   
So what if they were in Tartarus? So what if they stood a slim chance of surviving? He was so glad that they were together, he had the ridiculous urge to smile.  
Physically, Percy felt better too, though his clothes looked like he’d been through a hurricane of broken glass. He was thirsty, hungry, and scared out of his mind (though he wasn’t going to tell Annabeth that), but he’d shaken off the hopeless cold of the River Cocytus. And as nasty as the firewater tasted, it seemed to keep him going.  
“Good good.” Poseidon was mumbling under his breath in worry of his only son.  
Time was impossible to judge. They trudged along, following the river as it cut through the harsh landscape. Fortunately the empousai weren’t exactly speed walkers. They shuffled on their mismatched bronze and donkey legs, hissing and fighting with each other, apparently in no hurry to reach the Doors of Death.  
Once, the demons sped up in excitement and swarmed something that looked like a beached carcass on the riverbank. Percy couldn’t tell what it was—a fallen monster? An animal of some kind? The empousai attacked it with relish.  
“OMG what is wrong with that place!” a mortal cried in terror. “A lot” was my only response.  
When the demons moved on, Percy and Annabeth reached the spot and found nothing left except a few splintered bones and glistening stains drying in the heat of the river. Percy had no doubt the empousai would devour demigods with the same gusto.  
“Come on.” He led Annabeth gently away from the scene. “We don’t want to lose them.”  
As they walked, Percy thought about the first time he’d fought the empousa Kelli at Goode High School’s freshman orientation, when he and Rachel Elizabeth Dare got trapped in the band hall. At the time, it seemed like a hopeless situation. Now, he’d give anything to have a problem that simple. At least he’d been in the mortal world then. Here, there was nowhere to run.  
He was starting to have flashbacks of his time in tartarus and he could tell Annabeth was too. All of a sudden he could feel someone picking him up an carrying him somewhere else. He couldn’t focus on anything around him and all he could see was memories rushing through his head. When he finally became aware of his surroundings he looked up and saw his dad’s worried face, I glanced over at Annabeth to make sure she was ok and saw she was in a similar situation with her mom Athena. They must have carried us out into the hallway as to not have us breaking down in front of everyone and for that I was very grateful. “Hey are you ok now?” My dad asked me. I nodded and that's when I noticed my face was wet, did that mean I had started to cry. I wiped away my tears and slowly got to my feet and walked unsteadily over to Annabeth who was still crying and shaking.   
“You ok Wisegirl?” I asked soothingly as I sat down next to her and started to rub her back. “No, I’m not ok. I can’t listen to it. The memories of what happened down there just keep swirling through my head and I just can’t.” She said still shaking and a new wave of tears started. I hugging her close to me and I was trying so hard not to cry myself because I needed to be strong for Annabeth. “I know exactly how you feel and I can’t stop seeing Bob and Damasen fighting as the doors close.” It’s just not fair that they sacrificed themselves when they deserved to come to.” I said not able to hold back the tears anymore. We sat there for a while just crying and holding each other as our parents watched sadly.   
Annabeth suddenly spoke up “Mom you guys can go back in and listen. Me and Percy will just stay here because it hurts to much to remember. Tell everyone we are ok now.” Athena looked at us skeptically before agreeing and walking back into the gym to continue reading.  
Piper’s Point of View  
I am really worried about Percy and Annabeth. I knew a lot of bad stuff had happened when they were down in tartarus and that they don’t like to talk about it. To be honest their reactions really scared me, Annabeth is like my best friend and is always so strong and logical and I’m usually the one who is emotional which is why we get along so well. I can’t get it out of my head. Their shaking bodies and dark eyes filled with pain and they seemed like they weren’t even aware of their surroundings. As soon as it started all of us demigods got up and were about to rush over to them but their parents beat us to it. They scooped up their children and shot us looks like ‘we’ll take care of this before flashing out of the room. All of the demigods and Paul were still really worried so we decided to hold a meeting before we continue and while we wait for them to come back. “Guys we need to help them” I said to start the conversation. “Obviously but how do we do that when we still don’t know what all happened to them” Jason said pointing out a good fact. “Um... let’s make a list of their new behavior since they got back.” Hazel said causing us all to nod our heads in agreement. Frank got out a piece of paper and a pencil from hi bag and we got to work.   
List:  
Never leaves each other  
Quieter  
Have nightmares only the other can help  
Eat more food  
Stare at the stars and mumble something every night  
Have flashbacks (Not that bad)  
More experience and strength  
“That's a good start we can add to it later” Leo said and was actually acting serious because his friends were in pain.  
Just than Poseidon and Athena flashed back in and told us they would be ok but weren’t going to come back until the chapter’s about Tartarus end.  
We were less concerned now and so we all got settled down again to read.  
Wow. When he started looking back on the war with Kronos as the good old days—that was sad. He kept hoping things would get better for Annabeth and him, but their lives just got more and more dangerous, as if the Three Fates were up there spinning their futures with barbed wire instead of thread just to see how much two demigods could tolerate.  
“Ouch I feel so bad for them” Thalia said in sympathy while Nico nodded because besides Nico she was the only one who was present during the Titan war. The rest of us grew concerned again since we still didn’t know what happened during the Titan war since most demigods don’t like to talk about it.  
After a few more miles, the empousai disappeared over a ridge. When Percy and Annabeth caught up, they found themselves at the edge of another massive cliff. The River Phlegethon spilled over the side in jagged tiers of fiery waterfalls. The demon ladies were picking their way down the cliff, jumping from ledge to ledge like mountain goats.

Percy’s heart crept into his throat. Even if he and Annabeth reached the bottom of the cliff alive, they didn’t have much to look forward to. The landscape below them was a bleak, ash-gray plain bristling with black trees, like insect hair. The ground was pocked with blisters. Every once in a while, a bubble would swell and burst, disgorging a monster like a larva from an egg.  
“Omg! Why is everything down there so gross?!?!?!” Aphrodite said while grimacing in disgust.  
Suddenly Percy wasn’t hungry anymore.  
“Don’t blame you man because I wouldn’t be either” Jason said while holding his stomach  
All the newly formed monsters were crawling and hobbling in the same direction—toward a bank of black fog that swallowed the horizon like a storm front. The Phlegethon flowed in the same direction until about halfway across the plain, where it met another river of black water—maybe the Cocytus? The two floods combined in a steaming, boiling cataract and flowed on as one toward the black fog.  
The longer Percy looked into that storm of darkness, the less he wanted to go there. It could be hiding anything—an ocean, a bottomless pit, an army of monsters. But if the Doors of Death were in that direction, it was their only chance to get home.  
He peered over the edge of the cliff.  
“Wish we could fly,” he muttered.  
Poseidon was worried “It must be a really bad situation if my son wants to fly”  
Annabeth rubbed her arms. “Remember Luke’s winged shoes? I wonder if they’re still down here somewhere.”  
“Who’s Luke?” I asked curiously and I saw Hermes flinch and a sad look covered his usually smiling face. I really regretted asking that question now. “Um... He was my son and he joined Kronos in the Titan war after trying to kill Percy, He even poisoned Thalia’s tree and in the end was the host to Kronos himself. He died killing himself to expel Kronos with Annabeth’s Dagger that he had given her when she was seven that Percy gave to him.” Hermes said sadly and now I felt really guilty.  
Percy remembered. Those shoes had been cursed to drag their wearer into Tartarus. They’d almost taken his best friend, Grover. “I’d settle for a hang glider.”  
“Maybe not a good idea.” Annabeth pointed. Above them, dark winged shapes spiraled in and out of the bloodred clouds.  
“Furies?” Percy wondered.  
“Or some other kind of demon,” Annabeth said. “Tartarus has thousands.”  
“Including the kind that eats hang gliders,” Percy guessed. “Okay, so we climb.”  
“They did a lot of climbing down there no wonder they were so fit after they came out despite looking starved to death.” Frank said   
He couldn’t see the empousai below them anymore. They’d disappeared behind one of the ridges, but that didn’t matter. It was clear where he and Annabeth needed to go. Like all the maggot monsters crawling over the plains of Tartarus, they should head toward the dark horizon. Percy was just brimming with enthusiasm for that.  
“Ok that’s the end of the chapter. Who wants to read next?”  
“I will” Aphrodite said jumping up and down.


	16. Percy XIV

AS THEY STARTED DOWN THE CLIFF, Percy concentrated on the challenges at hand: keeping his footing, avoiding rockslides that would alert the empousai to their presence, and of course making sure he and Annabeth didn’t plummet to their deaths.  
“That’s a good goal, Not dying I mean” Nico said  
About halfway down the precipice, Annabeth said, “Stop, okay? Just a quick break.”  
Her legs wobbled so badly, Percy cursed himself for not calling a rest earlier.  
“Of course you did Percy because you always care about everyone else over yourself” Hazel said sadly.  
They sat together on a ledge next to a roaring fiery waterfall. Percy put his arm around Annabeth, and she leaned against him, shaking from exhaustion.  
He wasn’t much better. His stomach felt like it had shrunk to the size of a gumdrop. If they came across any more monster carcasses, he was afraid he might pull an empousa and try to devour it.  
My face scrunched up in disgust but I don’t exactly blame him.  
At least he had Annabeth. They would find a way out of Tartarus. They had to. He didn’t think much of fates and prophecies, but he did believe in one thing: Annabeth and he were supposed to be together. They hadn’t survived so much just to get killed now.  
“Things could be worse,” Annabeth ventured.  
“Yeah?” Percy didn’t see how, but he tried to sound upbeat.  
She snuggled against him. Her hair smelled of smoke, and if he closed his eyes, he could almost imagine they were at the campfire at Camp Half-Blood.

“I still wish we had more time to spend at camp before summer ended.” Leo said

“We could’ve fallen into the River Lethe,” she said. “Lost all our memories.”

Percy’s skin crawled just thinking about it. He’d had enough trouble with amnesia for one lifetime. Only last month, Hera had erased his memories to put him among the Roman demigods. Percy had stumbled into Camp Jupiter with no idea who he was or where he came from. And a few years before that, he’d fought a Titan on the banks of the Lethe, near Hades’s palace. He’d blasted the Titan with water from that river and completely wiped his memory clean. “Yeah, the Lethe,” he muttered. “Not my favorite.”

“Wait how many Titans has Percy fought against?” I asked curiously.”Um... A lot actually but that Titan he fought along with me and Thalia because we were on a quest for Persephone and not many people even knew that happened.” Nico answered.

“What was the Titan’s name?” Annabeth asked.

“Uh…Iapetus. He said it meant the Impaler or something.”

“No, the name you gave him after he lost his memory. Steve?”

“Bob,” Percy said.

Annabeth managed a weak laugh. “Bob the Titan.”

“What happened to Bob?” Hazel said and Thalia just motioned for us to keep listening.

Percy’s lips were so parched, it hurt to smile. He wondered what had happened to Iapetus after they’d left him in Hades’s palace…if he was still content being Bob, friendly, happy, and clueless. Percy hoped so, but the Underworld seemed to bring out the worst in everyone—monsters, heroes, and gods.

He gazed across the ashen plains. The other Titans were supposed to be here in Tartarus—maybe bound in chains, or roaming aimlessly, or hiding in some of those dark crevices. Percy and his allies had destroyed the worst Titan, Kronos, but even his remains might be down here somewhere—a billion angry Titan particles floating through the blood-colored clouds or lurking in that dark fog.

Percy decided not to think about that. He kissed Annabeth’s forehead. “We should keep moving. You want some more fire to drink?”

“Ugh. I’ll pass.”

They struggled to their feet. The rest of the cliff looked impossible to descend—nothing more than a crosshatching of tiny ledges—but they kept climbing down.

Percy’s body went on autopilot. His fingers cramped. He felt blisters popping up on his ankles. He got shaky from hunger.

He wondered if they would die of starvation, or if the firewater would keep them going. He remembered the punishment of Tantalus, who’d been permanently stuck in a pool of water under a fruit tree but couldn’t reach either food or drink.  
“Oh My God that guy was the worst! I wasn’t even there but I heard the horror stories about when he was at camp. He reinstated Chariot races and never even cared about anything other than food. Chariot races were banned for a reason and he wouldn’t even let us guard the camp or go on a quest when it was obviously needed so we wouldn’t all die!” Nico ranted and I could see Thalia nodding her head. Wow that guy must have done something really bad. I thought.

Jeez, Percy hadn’t thought about Tantalus in years. That stupid guy had been paroled briefly to serve as director at Camp Half-Blood. Probably he was back in the Fields of Punishment. Percy had never felt sorry for the jerk before, but now he was starting to sympathize. He could imagine what it would be like, getting hungrier and hungrier for eternity but never being able to eat.

“Poor Percy he must be feeling really hungry to be sympathizing with that stupid guy. I mean there is a reason he is in the fields of punishment.” Hazel said sadly.

Keep climbing, he told himself.

Cheeseburgers, his stomach replied.

Shut up, he thought.

With fries, his stomach complained.

We all laughed at the thought that Percy had a conversation with his stomach.

A billion years later, with a dozen new blisters on his feet, Percy reached the bottom. He helped Annabeth down, and they collapsed on the ground.

Ahead of them stretched miles of wasteland, bubbling with monstrous larvae and big insect-hair trees. To their right, the Phlegethon split into branches that etched the plain, widening into a delta of smoke and fire. To the north, along the main route of the river, the ground was riddled with cave entrances. Here and there, spires of rock jutted up like exclamation points.

“That doesn’t sound ideal for hiding and not getting caught.” A mortal said.

Under Percy’s hand, the soil felt alarmingly warm and smooth. He tried to grab a handful, then realized that under a thin layer of dirt and debris, the ground was a single vast membrane…like skin.

He almost threw up, but forced himself not to. There was nothing in his stomach but fire.

“Ew!” A bunch of girls and some of the guys screeched imagining the scene.

He didn’t mention it to Annabeth, but he started to feel like something was watching them—something vast and malevolent. He couldn’t zero in on it, because the presence was all around them. Watching was the wrong word, too. That implied eyes, and this thing was simply aware of them. The ridges above them now looked less like steps and more like rows of massive teeth. The spires of rock looked like broken ribs. And if the ground was skin…

Nico gasped “Tartarus is watching them!” he whispered but we all heard him and whipped our heads around and stared at him fear, concern and worry for their friends all swirling in their eyes.

Percy forced those thoughts aside. This place was just freaking him out. That was all.

Annabeth stood, wiping soot from her face. She gazed toward the darkness on the horizon. “We’re going to be completely exposed, crossing this plain.”

About a hundred yards ahead of them, a blister burst on the ground. A monster clawed its way out…a glistening telkhine with slick fur, a seal-like body, and stunted human limbs. It managed to crawl a few yards before something shot out of the nearest cave, so fast that Percy could only register a dark green reptilian head. The monster snatched the squealing telkhine in its jaws and dragged it into the darkness.

I started to hyperventilate thinking about all the horrors that my friends had to face down in Tartarus all alone with no allies but each other and I now understood why they had those terrifying reactions to even hearing the name ‘Tartarus’. I knew even if we found out what happened we would never really understand because we had not been there or actually experienced it first hand. I veagly could feel Jason shaking me and telling me everything was going to be alright while I still had tears falling down my face. I somehow managed to calm down. Jason insisted I rested but I was determined now. I was going to listen to what happened and I was going to find away to help my friends to get over it.

Reborn in Tartarus for two seconds, only to be eaten. Percy wondered if that telkhine would pop up some other place in Tartarus, and how long it would take to re-form.

He swallowed down the sour taste of firewater. “Oh, yeah. This’ll be fun.”

Annabeth helped him to his feet. He took one last look at the cliffs, but there was no going back. He would’ve given a thousand golden drachmas to have Frank Zhang with them right now—good old Frank, who always seemed to show up when needed and could turn into an eagle or a dragon to fly them across this stupid wasteland.  
“As bad as this sounds I wish I had been there too just so they wouldn’t have to be alone.” Frank said starting to cry as well at the thought that his friends had needed him but he wasn’t there.

They started walking, trying to avoid the cave entrances, sticking close to the bank of the river.

They were just skirting one of the spires when a glint of movement caught Percy’s eye—something darting between the rocks to their right.

A monster following them? Or maybe it was just some random baddie, heading for the Doors of Death.

Suddenly he remembered why they’d started following this route, and he froze in his tracks.

“NO,No,no it is a trap” Leo said grabbing my arm and shaking me while I was just shell shocked at the revelation that their was almost no way they would get out of that fight without severe injuries.

“The empousai.” He grabbed Annabeth’s arm. “Where are they?”

Annabeth scanned a three-sixty, her gray eyes bright with alarm.

Maybe the demon ladies had been snapped up by that reptile in the cave. If the empousai were still ahead of them, they should’ve been visible somewhere on the plains.

Unless they were hiding…

Too late, Percy drew his sword.

The empousai emerged from the rocks all around them—five of them forming a ring. A perfect trap.  
“Why does this always happen to them?” Thalia said worry was clear in her voice.

Kelli limped forward on her mismatched legs. Her fiery hair burned across her shoulders like a miniature Phlegethon waterfall. Her tattered cheerleader outfit was splattered with rusty-brown stains, and Percy was pretty sure they weren’t ketchup. She fixed him with her glowing red eyes and bared her fangs.

“Percy Jackson,” she cooed. “How awesome! I don’t even have to return to the mortal world to destroy you!”

“That's the end of the chapter” Aphrodite said excitedly like Percy and Annabeth weren’t about to get killed.

“I’ll read next” Frank said taking the book.


	17. Percy XV

PERCY RECALLED HOW DANGEROUS Kelli had been the last time they’d fought in the Labyrinth. Despite those mismatched legs, she could move fast when she wanted to. She’d dodged his sword strikes and would have eaten his face if Annabeth hadn’t stabbed her from behind.

Now she had four friends with her.

“Percy always has the worst luck and because of how many monsters he has fought and killed in the last few years all the monsters down their have a serious grudge against him” Nico said

“And your friend Annabeth is with you!” Kelli hissed with laughter. “Oh, yeah, I totally remember her.”

Kelli touched her own sternum, where the tip of the knife had exited when Annabeth stabbed her in the back. “What’s the matter, daughter of Athena? Don’t have your weapon? Bummer. I’d use it to kill you.”

Percy tried to think. He and Annabeth stood shoulder to shoulder as they had many times before, ready to fight. But neither of them was in good shape for battle. Annabeth was empty-handed. They were hopelessly outnumbered. There was nowhere to run. No help coming.

“Annabeth being empty handed is a serious issue especially where they are.” I said with concern

Briefly Percy considered calling for Mrs. O’Leary, his hellhound friend who could shadow-travel. Even if she heard him, could she make it into Tartarus? This was where monsters went when they died. Calling her here might kill her, or turn her back to her natural state as a fierce monster. No…he couldn’t do that to his dog.

“There he goes again thinking about others over himself even if it means he dies.” Jason said.

So, no help. Fighting was a long shot.

That left Annabeth’s favorite tactics: trickery, talk, delay.

“So…” he started, “I guess you’re wondering what we’re doing in Tartarus.”

Kelli snickered. “Not really. I just want to kill you.”

That would’ve been it, but Annabeth chimed in.

“YEAH GO ANNABETH!” Leo Yelled making us laugh at his ridiculousness.

“Too bad,” she said. “Because you have no idea what’s going on in the mortal world.”

The other empousai circled, watching Kelli for a cue to attack; but the ex-cheerleader only snarled, crouching out of reach of Percy’s sword.

“We know enough,” Kelli said. “Gaea has spoken.”

“You’re heading toward a major defeat.” Annabeth sounded so confident, even Percy was impressed. She glanced at the other empousai, one by one, then pointed accusingly at Kelli. “This one claims she’s leading you to a victory. She’s lying. The last time she was in the mortal world, Kelli was in charge of keeping my friend Luke Castellan faithful to Kronos. In the end, Luke rejected him. He gave his life to expel Kronos. The Titans lost because Kelli failed. Now Kelli wants to lead you to another disaster.”

Hermes looked down again sadly at the mention of his dead son.

The other empousai muttered and shifted uneasily.

“Enough!” Kelli’s fingernails grew into long black talons. She glared at Annabeth as if imagining her sliced into small pieces.

Percy was pretty sure Kelli had had a thing for Luke Castellan. Luke had that effect on girls—even donkey-legged vampires—and Percy wasn’t sure bringing up his name was such a good idea.

“The girl lies,” Kelli said. “So the Titans lost. Fine! That was part of the plan to wake Gaea! Now the Earth Mother and her giants will destroy the mortal world, and we will totally feast on demigods!”

The other vampires gnashed their teeth in a frenzy of excitement. Percy had been in the middle of a school of sharks when the water was full of blood. That wasn’t nearly as scary as empousai ready to feed.

“Um... Sharks wouldn't hurt him though right? I mean he is the son of Poseidon.” Frank said curiously. “They wouldn’t because they know I would be mad when I found out.” Poseidon said

He prepared to attack, but how many could he dispatch before they overwhelmed him? It wouldn’t be enough.

“The demigods have united!” Annabeth yelled. “You’d better think twice before you attack us. Romans and Greeks will fight you together. You don’t stand a chance!”

The empousai backed up nervously, hissing, “Romani.”

Percy guessed they’d had experience with the Twelfth Legion before, and it hadn’t worked out well for them.

The Roman demigods chuckled and smirked proudly at that.

“Yeah, you bet Romani.” Percy bared his forearm and showed them the brand he’d gotten at Camp Jupiter—the SPQR mark, with the trident of Neptune. “You mix Greek and Roman, and you know what you get? You get BAM!”

“Ha Ha Ha Ha TAKE THAT!” Leo laughed really loudly while the rest of demigods just looked at each other proudly that they now all got along with each other instead of remaining ignorant and hostile towards each other.

He stomped his foot, and the empousai scrambled back. One fell off the boulder where she’d been perched.

That made Percy feel good, but they recovered quickly and closed in again.

“Bold talk,” Kelli said, “for two demigods lost in Tartarus. Lower your sword, Percy Jackson, and I’ll kill you quickly. Believe me, there are worse ways to die down here.”  
“I don't want to believe it and I know that they could make it through any task.” A mortal friend of Percy that I had seen Percy and Annabeth talking to earlier spoke up.

“Wait!” Annabeth tried again. “Aren’t empousai the servants of Hecate?”

Kelli curled her lip. “So?”

“So Hecate is on our side now,” Annabeth said. “She has a cabin at Camp Half-Blood. Some of her demigod children are my friends. If you fight us, she’ll be angry.”

“She has a good point. Hecate even helped us on our quest she wasn’t just on our side now” Hazel commented thoughtfully 

Percy wanted to hug Annabeth, she was so brilliant.

One of the other empousai growled. “Is this true, Kelli? Has our mistress made peace with Olympus?”

“Shut up, Serephone!” Kelli screeched. “Gods, you’re annoying!”

“I will not cross the Dark Lady.”

Annabeth took the opening. “You’d all be better following Serephone. She’s older and wiser.”

“Yes!” Serephone shrieked. “Follow me!”

“Fell right into that trap stupid monster. Come on and just fight already talking is so boring when you could just kill them violently and with tons of blood!!!” Ares said getting agitated. 

Kelli struck so fast, Percy didn’t have the chance to raise his sword. Fortunately, she didn’t attack him. Kelli lashed out at Serephone. For half a second, the two demons were a blur of slashing claws and fangs.

Then it was over. Kelli stood triumphant over a pile of dust. From her claws hung the tattered remains of Serephone’s dress.

“THERE SEE THEY CAN DO THING THE RIGHT WAY!!!” Ares shouted before Athena smacked him on the head and told him to shut up.

“Any more issues?” Kelli snapped at her sisters. “Hecate is the goddess of the Mist! Her ways are mysterious. Who knows which side she truly favors? She is also the goddess of the crossroads, and she expects us to make our own choices. I choose the path that will bring us the most demigod blood! I choose Gaea!”

Her friends hissed in approval.

Annabeth glanced at Percy, and he saw that she was out of ideas. She’d done what she could. She’d gotten Kelli to eliminate one of her own. Now there was nothing left but to fight.

Everyone tensed waiting for the fight that was inevitably coming.

“For two years I churned in the void,” Kelli said. “Do you know how completely annoying it is to be vaporized, Annabeth Chase? Slowly re-forming, fully conscious, in searing pain for months and years as your body regrows, then finally breaking the crust of this hellish place and clawing your way back to daylight? All because some little girl stabbed you in the back?”

“No I don’t and I’m glad I don’t because it is what you get for trying to kill people.” I said darkly and caused Jason and Leo to lean away from me and the dark aura that was around me.

Her baleful eyes held Annabeth’s. “I wonder what happens if a demigod is killed in Tartarus. I doubt it’s ever happened before. Let’s find out.”

Percy sprang, slashing Riptide in a huge arc. He cut one of the demons in half, but Kelli dodged and charged Annabeth. The other two empousai launched themselves at Percy. One grabbed his sword arm. Her friend jumped on his back.

Percy tried to ignore them and staggered toward Annabeth, determined to go down defending her if he had to; but Annabeth was doing pretty well. She tumbled to one side, evading Kelli’s claws, and came up with a rock in her hand, which she smacked into Kelli’s nose.

“Go Annabeth! Fight back!” All of us demigods were cheering them on.

Kelli wailed. Annabeth scooped up gravel and flung it in the empousa’s eyes.

Meanwhile Percy thrashed from side to side, trying to throw off his empousa hitchhiker, but her claws sank deeper into his shoulders. The second empousa held his arm, preventing him from using Riptide.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Kelli lunge, raking her talons across Annabeth’s arm. Annabeth screamed and fell.

“NO!” Now everyone was yelling at them cheering them on even the mortals and Gods.

Percy stumbled in her direction. The vampire on his back sank her teeth into his neck. Searing pain coursed through his body. His knees buckled.

Stay on your feet, he told himself. You have to beat them.

Then the other vampire bit his sword arm, and Riptide clattered to the ground.

That was it. His luck had finally run out. Kelli loomed over Annabeth, savoring her moment of triumph. The other two empousai circled Percy, their mouths slavering, ready for another taste.

“COME ON GET UP I KNOW YOU CAN DO IT!” I screamed at the book

Then a shadow fell across Percy. A deep war cry bellowed from somewhere above, echoing across the plains of Tartarus, and a Titan dropped onto the battlefield.

“That's the end of the chapter”

“Oh my gods... A TITAN!” Jason said freaking out. “HOW ARE THEY EVEN ALIVE!!! I fought a titan and it almost killed me so many times before I killed it!” Jason was still freaking out but I was trying to calm my boyfriend down and it was working slowly. “Remember Percy has fought a lot of Titans before and killed them.” Nico reminded us but that still didn’t help ease our concern. Percy and Annabeth were in no condition to be fighting any monsters let alone a Titan and they were already pinned down and about to die and Annabeth doesn't even have a way to defend herself. Internally I was freaking out because what if it was one of the Titans they had fought before and it was back for revenge. Guess we'll just have to wait and see...


	18. Percy XVI

PERCY THOUGHT HE WAS HALLUCINATING. It just wasn’t possible that a huge, silvery figure could drop out of the sky and stomp Kelli flat, trampling her into a mound of monster dust.

“With you anything is possible Percy” Jason said voice still slightly panicked after his freak out session about his ‘Bro’.

But that’s exactly what happened. The Titan was ten feet tall, with wild silver Einstein hair, pure silver eyes, and muscular arms protruding from a ripped-up blue janitor’s uniform. In his hand was a massive push broom. His name tag, incredibly, read BOB.

Everyone breathed a sigh of relief that it was not an enemy.

Annabeth yelped and tried to crawl away, but the giant janitor wasn’t interested in her. He turned to the two remaining empousai, who stood over Percy.

One was foolish enough to attack. She lunged with the speed of a tiger, but she never stood a chance. A spearhead jutted from the end of Bob’s broom. With a single deadly swipe, he cut her to dust. The last vampire tried to run. Bob threw his broom like a massive boomerang (was there such a thing as a broomerang?). It sliced through the vampire and returned to Bob’s hand.

“Ha! Even in a situation like this Percy is still Percy!” Leo said still laughing

“SWEEP!” The Titan grinned with delight and did a victory dance. “Sweep, sweep, sweep!”

Percy couldn’t speak. He couldn’t bring himself to believe that something good had actually happened. Annabeth looked just as shocked.

“H-how…?” she stammered.

“Percy called me!” the janitor said happily. “Yes, he did.”

“He did?” We all asked curious when that had happened.  
Annabeth crawled a little farther away. Her arm was bleeding badly. “Called you? He—wait. You’re Bob? The Bob?”

Nico smirked sadly thinking about how Percy said that he had sacrificed himself so they could escape and said “The one and only”

The janitor frowned when he noticed Annabeth’s wounds. “Owie.”

Annabeth flinched as he knelt next to her.

“It’s okay,” Percy said, still woozy with pain. “He’s friendly.”

He remembered when he’d first met Bob. The Titan had healed a bad wound on Percy’s shoulder just by touching it. Sure enough, the janitor tapped Annabeth’s forearm and it mended instantly.

“That's a cool trick good thing he is on our side now.” Frank said approvingly 

Bob chuckled, pleased with himself, then bounded over to Percy and healed his bleeding neck and arm. The Titan’s hands were surprisingly warm and gentle.

“All better!” Bob declared, his eerie silver eyes crinkling with pleasure. “I am Bob, Percy’s friend!”

We all smiled at the thought that only Percy could make friends with a Titan.

“Uh…yeah,” Percy managed. “Thanks for the help, Bob. It’s really good to see you again.”

“Yes!” the janitor agreed. “Bob. That’s me. Bob, Bob, Bob.” He shuffled around, obviously pleased with his name. “I am helping. I heard my name. Upstairs in Hades’s palace, nobody calls for Bob unless there is a mess. Bob, sweep up these bones. Bob, mop up these tortured souls. Bob, a zombie exploded in the dining room.”

We all looked at Hades at that last one and he looked away kind of guilty.

Annabeth gave Percy a puzzled look, but he had no explanation.

“Then I heard my friend call!” The Titan beamed. “Percy said, Bob!”

“He could have been talking to someone else named Bob though. Imagine if he had been at school and than Bob just burst in the room and everyone started freaking out except Percy and he would just look exasperated of something.” Leo said and in the end we were all on the floor laughing.

He grabbed Percy’s arm and hoisted him to his feet.

“That’s awesome,” Percy said. “Seriously. But how did you—”

“Oh, time to talk later.” Bob’s expression turned serious. “We must go before they find you. They are coming. Yes, indeed.”

“Um that can’t be good” Hazel said getting off the floor to sit back on her couch.

“They?” Annabeth asked.

Percy scanned the horizon. He saw no approaching monsters—nothing but the stark gray wasteland.

“Yes,” Bob agreed. “But Bob knows a way. Come on, friends! We will have fun!”

“Sure wandering through Tartarus with a Titan and more monsters coming after you is so much fun” I said sarcastically.

“That's the end of the chapter who wants to read next?”   
“I do” I said before taking the book.  
Percy and Annabeth came back in since the Tartarus chapters were done for now and we settled down and I began to read.


	19. Frank XVII

FRANK WOKE UP AS A PYTHON, which puzzled him.

“How did you turn into a python?” Lucy asked curiously, “Well I am a descendant of Poseidon and that was one of the powers that was passed down from him.” Frank explained sheepishly while scratching his neck.

Changing into an animal wasn’t confusing. He did that all the time. But he had never changed from one animal to another in his sleep before. He was pretty sure he hadn’t dozed off as a snake. Usually, he slept like a dog.

“Like that's not weird either.” Leo commented dryly at a blushing Frank. “I think it's cute” Hazel said shyly while blushing causing Frank to blush even deeper red.

He’d discovered that he got through the night much better if he curled up on his bunk in the shape of a bulldog. For whatever reason, his nightmares didn’t bother him as much. The constant screaming in his head almost disappeared.

“What screaming in your head? You never mentioned that back on the Argo II? Hazel asked concerned for Frank while Frank just looked away and responded “Im sure it will explain it.”

He had no idea why he’d become a reticulated python, but it did explain his dream about slowly swallowing a cow. His jaw was still sore.

Frank blushed again and tried to hide behind Hazel who was sitting next to him.

He braced himself and changed back to human form. Immediately, his splitting headache returned, along with the voices.

Fight them! yelled Mars. Take this ship! Defend Rome!

The voice of Ares shouted back: Kill the Romans! Blood and death! Large guns!

His father’s Roman and Greek personalities screamed back and forth in Frank’s mind with the usual soundtrack of battle noises—explosions, assault rifles, roaring jet engines—all throbbing like a subwoofer behind Frank’s eyes.

“Ow that must hurt” I said rubbing his forehead in sympathy. Ares had the decency to look away from Frank.

He sat up on his berth, dizzy with pain. As he did every morning, he took a deep breath and stared at the lamp on his desk—a tiny flame that burned night and day, fueled by magic olive oil from the supply room.

Fire…Frank’s biggest fear. Keeping an open flame in his room terrified him, but it also helped him focus. The noise in his head faded to the background, allowing him to think.

He’d gotten better at this, but for days he’d been almost worthless. As soon as the fighting broke out at Camp Jupiter, the war god’s two voices had started screaming nonstop. Ever since, Frank had been stumbling around in a daze, barely able to function. He’d acted like a fool, and he was sure his friends thought he’d lost his marbles.

“Um we didn’t really but we were definitely worried about you.” Piper said soothingly to Frank to ease his embarrassment. 

He couldn’t tell them what was wrong. There was nothing they could do, and from listening to them talk, Frank was pretty sure they didn’t have the same problem with their godly parents yelling in their ears.

“Nope” Jason said confirming Frank’s theory.

Just Frank’s luck, but he had to pull it together. His friends needed him—especially now, with Annabeth gone.

Annabeth had been kind to him. Even when he was so distracted he’d acted like a buffoon, Annabeth had been patient and helpful. While Ares screamed that Athena’s children couldn’t be trusted, and Mars bellowed at him to kill all the Greeks, Frank had grown to respect Annabeth.

Annabeth gave Frank an appreciative nod which he happily returned.

Now that they were without her, Frank was the next best thing the group had to a military strategist. They would need him for the trip ahead.

He rose and got dressed. Fortunately he’d managed to buy some new clothes in Siena a couple of days ago, replacing the laundry that Leo had sent flying away on Buford the table. (Long story.) He tugged on some Levi’s and an army-green T-shirt, then reached for his favorite pullover before remembering he didn’t need it. The weather was too warm. More important, he didn’t need the pockets anymore to protect the magical piece of firewood that controlled his life span. Hazel was keeping it safe for him.

“I am not explaining that!” Frank exclaimed before any of the mortals could speak up and ask about it. Everyone just nodded.

Maybe that should have made him nervous. If the firewood burned, Frank died: end of story. But he trusted Hazel more than he trusted himself. Knowing she was safeguarding his big weakness made him feel better—like he’d fastened his seat belt for a high-speed chase.

Hazel blushed a bright red and squeaked at Franks confession. Frank just looked away embarrassed. 

He slung his bow and quiver over his shoulder. Immediately they morphed into a regular backpack. Frank loved that. He never would’ve known about the quiver’s camouflage power if Leo hadn’t figured it out for him.

Leo! Mars raged. He must die!

Throttle him! Ares cried. Throttle everyone! Who are we talking about again?

“Wow! They really hate me. I wonder why?” Leo said nervously.

The two began shouting at each other again, over the sound of bombs exploding in Frank’s skull.

He steadied himself against the wall. For days, Frank had listened to those voices demanding Leo Valdez’s death.

“Ok so it's even worse than I thought.” Leo said and he looked over at Frank with a very pale face.

After all, Leo had started the war with Camp Jupiter by firing a ballista into the Forum. Sure, he’d been possessed at the time; but still Mars demanded vengeance. Leo made things harder by constantly teasing Frank, and Ares demanded that Frank retaliate for every insult.

“I would have stopped if you had asked or told me why I needed to stop! Bro we are still friends right?!” Leo was a mess now and was very worried until Frank said that yes he was still friends with Leo.

Frank kept the voices at bay, but it wasn’t easy.

On their trip across the Atlantic, Leo had said something that still stuck in Frank’s mind. When they’d learned that Gaea the evil earth goddess had put a bounty on their heads, Leo had wanted to know for how much.

I can understand not being as pricey as Jason or Percy, he’d said, but am I worth, like, two or three Franks?

Just another one of Leo’s stupid jokes, but the comment hit a little too close to home. On the Argo II, Frank definitely felt like the LVP—Least Valuable Player. Sure, he could turn into animals. So what? His biggest claim to helpfulness so far had been changing into a weasel to escape from an underground workshop, and even that had been Leo’s idea. Frank was better known for the Giant Goldfish Fiasco in Atlanta, and, just yesterday, for turning into a two-hundred-kilo gorilla only to get knocked senseless by a flash-bang grenade.  
“Wow I think we all felt like the most useless person on the team.” Jason said and everyone looked at him with confused expressions on their faces, so he patiently explained. “Thought I was the most useless person on the team because I always got knocked unconscious in every fight, Leo thought he was the seventh wheel and was useless, Frank thought he wasn't doing anything helpful or stuff like that. I don't know about anyone else yet but if we all thought we were useless than we should go and talk this out later.” Everyone just nodded in agreement.

Leo hadn’t made any gorilla jokes at his expense yet. But it was only a matter of time.

Kill him!

Torture him! Then kill him!

The two sides of the war god seemed to be kicking and punching each other inside Frank’s head, using his sinuses as a wrestling mat.

Blood! Guns!

Rome! War!

Quiet down, Frank ordered.

Amazingly, the voices obeyed.

Okay, then, Frank thought.

Maybe he could finally get those annoying screaming mini-gods under control. Maybe today would be a good day.

“Man you just jinxed it.” I said darkly.

That hope was shattered as soon as he climbed above deck.

“See, I was right!”

“What are they?” Hazel asked.

The Argo II was docked at a busy wharf. On one side stretched a shipping channel about half a kilometer wide. On the other spread the city of Venice—red-tiled roofs, metal church domes, steepled towers, and sun-bleached buildings in all the colors of Valentine candy hearts—red, white, ochre, pink, and orange.

Everywhere there were statues of lions—on top of pedestals, over doorways, on the porticoes of the largest buildings. There were so many, Frank figured the lion must be the city’s mascot.

“Well your right but it's not just a lion but a winged lion that is the mascot.” Annabeth said looking at Frank who nodded. “Yeah. That.” 

 

Where streets should have been, green canals etched their way through the   
neighborhoods, each one jammed with motorboats. Along the docks, the sidewalks were mobbed with tourists shopping at the T-shirt kiosks, overflowing from stores, and lounging across acres of outdoor café tables, like pods of sea lions. Frank had thought Rome was full of tourists. This place was insane.

Hazel and the rest of his friends weren’t paying attention to any of that, though. They had gathered at the starboard rail to stare at the dozens of weird shaggy monsters milling through the crowds.

Each monster was about the size of a cow, with a bowed back like a broken-down horse, matted gray fur, skinny legs, and black cloven hooves. The creatures’ heads seemed much too heavy for their necks. Their long, anteater-like snouts drooped to the ground. Their overgrown gray manes completely covered their eyes.

Frank watched as one of the creatures lumbered across the promenade, snuffling and licking the pavement with its long tongue. The tourists parted around it, unconcerned. A few even petted it. Frank wondered how the mortals could be so calm. Then the monster’s appearance flickered. For a moment it turned into an old, fat beagle.

Jason grunted. “The mortals think they’re stray dogs.”

“Or pets roaming around,” Piper said. “My dad shot a film in Venice once. I remember him telling me there were dogs everywhere. Venetians love dogs.”

“Wait your last name is McLean right?” A mortal asked Piper who guessed what the mortal was thinking answered “Yes and my dad is Tristan McLean so just go have your panic attacks already so we can get on with the story. Alas, when the mortals (mostly the girls) had calmed down we continued reading.

Frank frowned. He kept forgetting that Piper’s dad was Tristan McLean, A-list movie star. She didn’t talk about him much. She seemed pretty down-to-earth for a kid raised in Hollywood. That was fine with Frank. The last thing they needed on this quest was paparazzi taking pictures of all Frank’s epic fails.

“I hate the paparazzi.” Was Piper’s only comment.

“But what are they?” he asked, repeating Hazel’s question. “They look like…starving, shaggy cows with sheepdog hair.”

He waited for someone to enlighten him. Nobody volunteered any information.

“Maybe they’re harmless,” Leo suggested. “They’re ignoring the mortals.”

“Harmless!” Gleeson Hedge laughed. The satyr wore his usual gym shorts, sports shirt, and coach’s whistle. His expression was as gruff as ever, but he still had one pink rubber band stuck in his hair from the prankster dwarfs in Bologna. Frank was kind of scared to mention it to him. “Valdez, how many harmless monsters have we met? We should just aim the ballistae and see what happens!”

“Uh, no,” Leo said.

For once, Frank agreed with Leo. There were too many monsters. It would be impossible to target one without causing collateral damage in the crowds of tourists. Besides, if those creatures panicked and stampeded…

“Good call, Frank.” I said, a worried expression on my face for the poor mortals getting in the way of a war crazy Coach Hedge.

“We’ll have to walk through them and hope they’re peaceful,” Frank said, hating the idea already. “It’s the only way we’re going to track down the owner of that book.”

Leo pulled the leather-bound manual from underneath his arm. He’d slapped a sticky note on the cover with the address the dwarfs in Bologna had given him.

“La Casa Nera,” he read. “Calle Frezzeria.”

“The Black House,” Nico di Angelo translated. “Calle Frezzeria is the street.”

“Yeah, I didn’t know Nico was Italian until we were bringing the Athena Parthenos back to the US.” Reyna said with a pointed look at Nico for being so closed off and mysterious.

Frank tried not to flinch when he realized Nico was at his shoulder. The guy was so quiet and brooding, he almost seemed to dematerialize when he wasn’t speaking. Hazel might have been the one who came back from the dead, but Nico was way more ghostlike.

“Rude.” Nico said turning his head away from Frank, as if he was offended in some way.

“You speak Italian?” Frank asked.

Nico shot him a warning look, like: Watch the questions. He spoke calmly, though. “Frank is right. We have to find that address. The only way to do it is to walk the city. Venice is a maze. We’ll have to risk the crowds and those…whatever they are.”

Thunder rumbled in the clear summer sky. They’d passed through some storms the night before. Frank had thought they were over, but now he wasn’t sure. The air felt as thick and warm as sauna steam.

Jason frowned at the horizon. “Maybe I should stay on board. Lots of venti in that storm last night. If they decide to attack the ship again…”

He didn’t need to finish. They’d all had experiences with angry wind spirits. Jason was the only one who had much luck fighting them.

Coach Hedge grunted. “Well, I’m out, too. If you softhearted cupcakes are going to stroll through Venice without even whacking those furry animals on the head, forget it. I don’t like boring expeditions.”

“I really regret not going! I always miss the fun stuff!” Coach Hedge shouted, pouting from his seat on the couch. This all caused the mortals to start worrying.

“It’s okay, Coach.” Leo grinned. “We still have to repair the foremast. Then I need your help in the engine room. I’ve got an idea for a new installation.”

Frank didn’t like the gleam in Leo’s eye. Since Leo had found that Archimedes sphere, he’d been trying out a lot of “new installations.” Usually, they exploded or sent smoke billowing upstairs into Frank’s cabin.

“Well…” Piper shifted her feet. “Whoever goes should be good with animals. I, uh…I’ll admit I’m not great with cows.”

Frank figured there was a story behind that comment, but he decided not to ask.

“I’ll go,” he said.

He wasn’t sure why he volunteered—maybe because he was anxious to be useful for a change. Or maybe he didn’t want anyone beating him to the punch. Animals? Frank can turn into animals! Send him!

Leo patted him on shoulder and handed him the leather-bound book. “Awesome. If you pass a hardware store, could you get me some two-by-fours and a gallon of tar?”

“Really Leo, like he is going to have time to go shopping!” Annabeth said loudly.

“Leo,” Hazel chided, “it’s not a shopping trip.”

“I’ll go with Frank,” Nico offered.

Frank’s eye started twitching. The war gods’ voices rose to a crescendo in his head: Kill him! Graecus scum!

No! I love Graecus scum!

“Uh…you’re good with animals?” he asked.

Nico smiled without humor. “Actually, most animals hate me. They can sense death. But there’s something about this city.…” His expression turned grim. “Lots of death. Restless spirits. If I go, I may be able to keep them at bay. Besides, as you noticed, I speak Italian.”

“Sounds like a good enough plan to me!” I exclaimed, causing all the other demigods to sweatdrop, also causing all of the mortals to be really confused.

Leo scratched his head. “Lots of death, huh? Personally, I’m trying to avoid lots of death, but you guys have fun!”

Frank wasn’t sure what scared him more: shaggy-cow monsters, hordes of restless ghosts, or going somewhere alone with Nico di Angelo.

“Again, RUDE!” Nico said from where he was sitting.

“I’ll go too.” Hazel slipped her arm through Frank’s. “Three is the best number for a demigod quest, right?”

Frank tried not to look too relieved. He didn’t want to offend Nico. But he glanced at Hazel and told her with his eyes: Thank you thank you thank you.

Nico stared at the canals, as if wondering what new and interesting forms of evil spirits might be lurking there. “All right, then. Let’s go find the owner of that book.”

“Done, who wants to read next?” Surprisingly I felt the need to read, and so I raised my hand and was passed the book.


	20. Frank XVIII

FRANK MIGHT HAVE LIKED VENICE if it hadn’t been summertime and tourist season, and if the city wasn’t overrun with large hairy creatures. Between the rows of old houses and the canals, the sidewalks were already too narrow for the crowds jostling one another and stopping to take pictures. The monsters made things worse. They shuffled around with their heads down, bumping into mortals and sniffing the pavement.

“Did they not notice the monsters or where they seeing something else?” A teacher asked from the audience and Frank answered “They just thought they were stray dogs because of the mist”

One seemed to find something it liked at the edge of a canal. It nibbled and licked at a crack between the stones until it dislodged some sort of greenish root. The monster sucked it up happily and shambled along.

“Well, they’re plant-eaters,” Frank said. “That’s good news.”

Hazel slipped her hand into his. “Unless they supplement their diet with demigods. Let’s hope not.”

Frank was so pleased to be holding her hand, the crowds and the heat and the monsters suddenly didn’t seem so bad. He felt needed—useful.

Frank and Hazel blushed causing all the other demigods to chuckle at the innocent couple.

Not that Hazel required his protection. Anybody who’d seen her charging on Arion with her sword drawn would know she could take care of herself. Still, Frank liked being next to her, imagining he was her bodyguard. If any of these monsters tried to hurt her, Frank would gladly turn into a rhinoceros and push them into the canal.

Could he do a rhino? Frank had never tried that before.

“And your not ADHD?” Percy asked because that was definitely some ADHD right there. “Last time I checked, nope.” 

Nico stopped. “There.”

They’d turned onto a smaller street, leaving the canal behind. Ahead of them was a small plaza lined with five-story buildings. The area was strangely deserted—as if the mortals could sense it wasn’t safe. In the middle of the cobblestone courtyard, a dozen shaggy cow creatures were sniffing around the mossy base of an old stone well.

“A lot of cows in one place,” Frank said.

“Yeah, but look,” Nico said. “Past that archway.”

Nico’s eyes must’ve been better than his. Frank squinted. At the far end of the plaza, a stone archway carved with lions led into a narrow street. Just past the arch, one of the town houses was painted black—the only black building Frank had seen so far in Venice.

“La Casa Nera,” he guessed.

Hazel’s grip tightened on his fingers. “I don’t like that plaza. It feels…cold.”

Frank wasn’t sure what she meant. He was still sweating like crazy.

But Nico nodded. He studied the town-house windows, most of which were covered with wooden shutters. “You’re right, Hazel. This neighborhood is filled with lemures.”

“Those furry monkey things from madagascar?” A mortal asked kind of confused as to why they would be there. Nico just shook his head making the mortals even more confused.

“Lemurs?” Frank asked nervously. “I’m guessing you don’t mean the furry little guys from Madagascar?”

“Angry ghosts,” Nico said. “Lemures go back to Roman times. They hang around a lot of Italian cities, but I’ve never felt so many in one place. My mom told me…” He hesitated. “She used to tell me stories about the ghosts of Venice.”  
Again Frank wondered about Nico’s past, but he was afraid to ask. He caught Hazel’s eye.  
“Why were you scared? I might have tried to avoid the question at the time but I wouldn't do anything to hurt you.” Nico said and Frank just looked away embarrassed at his cowardly nature.  
Go ahead, she seemed to be saying. Nico needs practice talking to people.  
“No I don't Hazel!” Nico shouted indignantly while crossing his arms and pouting like a child.  
The sounds of assault rifles and atom bombs got louder in Frank’s head. Mars and Ares were trying to outsing each other with “Dixie” and “The Battle Hymn of the Republic.” Frank did his best to push that aside.  
“Nico, your mom was Italian?” he guessed. “She was from Venice?”  
“Wow Frank you actually asked him?!” Leo said with a loud unnecessary gasp.  
Nico nodded reluctantly. “She met Hades here, back in the 1930s. As World War Two got closer, she fled to the U.S. with my sister and me. I mean…Bianca, my other sister. I don’t remember much about Italy, but I can still speak the language.”  
“That's so sad that you had to flee your home when you were so little that you can't even remember it!” Piper said while the tears in her eyes showed that she was letting her emotions get the better of again. Nico just rolled his eyes and said “Piper your Aphrodite is showing, again.”  
Frank tried to think of a response. Oh, that’s nice didn’t seem to cut it.  
He was hanging out with not one but two demigods who’d been pulled out of time. They were both, technically, about seventy years older than he was.  
“Wait Nico died too and was also brought back to life?” Lucy asked. “Um... No... Back in about 1939 when the pact was made by the big three gods Poseidon, Zeus and Hades vowing that they would have no more kids because they were just too powerful. World War II was actually the children of Zeus and Poseidon on the Allied side vs Hades kids like Hitler were the axis powers. The big three tried to stop any more big wars between them to happen so Zeus tried to kill Bianca and Nico as well as their mom before they could grow up. Zeus succeeded in killing Nico’s mom but Hades found out what Zeus was planning and only managed to save the kids from Zeus’s attack. He hid them away in the lotus casino hotel with no memories until it was safe to come out. The lotus casino was also the home of the lotus eaters so time passes much faster there, I would know because that was where I got trapped once and met Nico even if I didn't know him yet. They were in there for 70 years until Hades deemed it safe but that was because I had already been claimed by Poseidon and Zeus was after me. Nico and Bianca thought they had been there for only a month but it was 70 years.” Percy explained and all the demigods just looked at him as if he had grown another head. He had just said something smart, but we quickly shook off our shock and went back to the book.  
“Must’ve been hard on your mom,” Frank said. “I guess we’ll do anything for someone we love.”  
Hazel squeezed his hand appreciatively. Nico stared at the cobblestones. “Yeah,” he said bitterly. “I guess we will.”  
Frank wasn’t sure what Nico was thinking. He had a hard time imagining Nico di Angelo acting out of love for anybody, except maybe Hazel. But Frank decided he’d gone as far as he dared with the personal questions.  
“So, the lemures…” He swallowed. “How do we avoid them?”  
“I’m already on it,” Nico said. “I’m sending out the message that they should stay away and ignore us. Hopefully that’s enough. Otherwise…things could get messy.”  
Hazel pursed her lips. “Let’s get going,” she suggested.  
Halfway across the piazza, everything went wrong; but it had nothing to do with ghosts.  
“Let me guess, the monsters were met eaters as well as plant eaters?” Jason asked “actually I don't know the answer to that... Nico do you remember what your card said?” Nico turned red at the mention of the card from his favorite game mythomagic “Um... they are plant eaters only.”  
They were skirting the well in the middle of the square, trying to give the cow monsters some distance, when Hazel stumbled on a loose piece of cobblestone. Frank caught her. Six or seven of the big gray beasts turned to look at them. Frank glimpsed a glowing green eye under one’s mane, and instantly he was hit with a wave of nausea, the way he felt when he ate too much cheese or ice cream.  
The creatures made deep throbbing sounds in their throats like angry foghorns.  
“Nice cows,” Frank murmured. He put himself between his friends and the monsters. “Guys, I’m thinking we should back out of here slowly.”  
“I’m such a klutz,” Hazel whispered. “Sorry.”  
“It’s not your fault,” Nico said. “Look at your feet.”  
Frank glanced down and caught his breath.  
Under their shoes, the paving stones were moving—spiky plant tendrils were pushing up from the cracks.  
Nico stepped back. The roots snaked out in his direction, trying to follow. The tendrils got thicker, exuding a steamy green vapor that smelled of boiled cabbage.  
“These roots seem to like demigods,” Frank noted.  
“Oh... so if the roots grow stronger and faster around demigods and the monsters eat the plants... oh you better just run now while you can” Annabeth gave a very helpful explanation to the confused mortals about how this was all going to end.  
Hazel’s hand drifted to her sword hilt. “And the cow creatures like the roots.”  
The entire herd was now looking their direction, making foghorn growls and stamping their hooves. Frank understood animal behavior well enough to get the message: You are standing on our food. That makes you enemies.  
Frank tried to think. There were too many monsters to fight. Something about their eyes hidden under those shaggy manes…Frank had gotten sick from the barest glimpse. He had a bad feeling that if those monsters made direct eye contact, he might get a lot worse than nauseous.  
“Don’t meet their eyes,” Frank warned. “I’ll distract them. You two back up slowly toward that black house.”  
The creatures tensed, ready to attack.  
“Never mind,” Frank said. “Run!”  
As it turned out, Frank could not turn into a rhino, and he lost valuable time trying.  
Frank let out a sigh because he had really wanted to be able to turn into a rhino and it was sad that he couldn’t.  
Nico and Hazel bolted for the side street. Frank stepped in front of the monsters, hoping to keep their attention. He yelled at the top of his lungs, imagining himself as a fearsome rhinoceros, but with Ares and Mars screaming in his head, he couldn’t concentrate. He remained regular-old Frank.  
Two of the cow monsters peeled off from the herd to chase Nico and Hazel.  
“No!” Frank yelled after them. “Me! I’m the rhino!”  
“Rhino’s don't talk Frank” Leo helpfully pointed out to a sad Frank since he wasn't able to save Hazel and Nico the first time.  
The rest of the herd surrounded Frank. They growled, emerald-green gas billowing from their nostrils. Frank stepped back to avoid the stuff, but the stench nearly knocked him over.  
Okay, so not a rhino. Something else. Frank knew he had only seconds before the monsters trampled or poisoned him, but he couldn’t think. He couldn’t hold the image of any animal long enough to change form.  
Then he glanced up at one of the town-house balconies and saw a stone carving—the symbol of Venice.  
The next instant, Frank was a full-grown lion. He roared in challenge, then sprang from the middle of the monster herd and landed eight meters away, on top of the old stone well.  
“Lion, Good choice Cupcake, NOW CLAW THEM TO MONSTER DUST!” Coach Hedge yelled while waving his baseball bat around.  
The monsters growled in reply. Three of them sprang at once, but Frank was ready. His lion reflexes were built for speed in combat.  
He slashed the first two monsters into dust with his claws, then sank his fangs into the third one’s throat and tossed it aside.  
There were seven left, plus the two chasing his friends. Not great odds, but Frank had to keep the bulk of herd focused on him. He roared at the monsters, and they edged away.  
They outnumbered him, yes. But Frank was a top-of-the-chain predator. The herd monsters knew it. They had also just watched him send three of their friends to Tartarus.  
He pressed his advantage and leaped off the well, still baring his fangs. The herd backed off.  
If he could just maneuver around them, then turn and run after his friends…  
He was doing all right, until he took his first backward step toward the arch. One of cows, either the bravest or the stupidest, took that as a sign of weakness. It charged and blasted Frank in the face with green gas.  
He slashed the monster to dust, but the damage was already done. He forced himself not to breathe. Regardless, he could feel the fur burning off his snout. His eyes stung. He staggered back, half-blind and dizzy, dimly aware of Nico screaming his name.  
“Frank! Frank!”  
“Was the green gas poisonous?” Paul asked concerned for Percy’s friends. “Um... Yeah it was but I got better and it wasn't the first time.” Frank said not really helping with Paul’s concern.  
He tried to focus. He was back in human form, retching and stumbling. His face felt like it was peeling off. In front of him, the green cloud of gas floated between him and the herd. The remaining cow monsters eyed him warily, probably wondering if Frank had any more tricks up his sleeve.  
He glanced behind him. Under the stone arch, Nico di Angelo was holding his black Stygian iron sword, gesturing at Frank to hurry. At Nico’s feet, two puddles of darkness stained the pavement—no doubt the remains of the cow monsters that had chased them.  
And Hazel…she was propped against the wall behind her brother. She wasn’t moving.  
Hazel felt like she was going to be sick from just remembering how bad she felt after all this was over.  
Frank ran toward them, forgetting about the monster herd. He rushed past Nico and grabbed Hazel’s shoulders. Her head slumped against her chest.  
“She got a blast of green gas right in the face,” Nico said miserably. “I—I wasn’t fast enough.”  
Frank couldn’t tell if she was breathing. Rage and despair battled inside him. He’d always been scared of Nico. Now he wanted to drop-kick the son of Hades into the nearest canal. Maybe that wasn’t fair, but Frank didn’t care. Neither did the war gods screaming in his head.  
“Wow Frank, didn't think you had it in you to even think something like that.” Jason commented making Frank blush for the millionth time this chapter.  
“We need to get her back to the ship,” Frank said.  
The cow monster herd prowled cautiously just beyond the archway. They bellowed their foghorn cries. From nearby streets, more monsters answered. Reinforcements would soon have the demigods surrounded.  
“We’ll never make it on foot,” Nico said. “Frank, turn into a giant eagle. Don’t worry about me. Get her back to the Argo II!”  
With his face burning and the voices screaming in his mind, Frank wasn’t sure he could change shape; but he was about to try when a voice behind them said, “Your friends can’t help you. They don’t know the cure.”  
Frank spun. Standing in the threshold of the Black House was a young man in jeans and a denim shirt. He had curly black hair and a friendly smile, though Frank doubted he was friendly. Probably he wasn’t even human.  
“Nope he was just a god not a monster.” Frank said seeing his friends worry.  
At the moment, Frank didn’t care.  
“Can you cure her?” he asked.  
“Of course,” the man said. “But you’d better hurry inside. I think you’ve angered every katobleps in Venice.”


	21. Frank XIX

THEY BARELY MADE IT INSIDE.  
Que the sighs of relief.  
As soon as their host threw the bolts, the cow monsters bellowed and slammed into the door, making it shudder on its hinges.  
“Oh, they can’t get in,” the man in denim promised. “You’re safe now!”  
“Safe?” Frank demanded. “Hazel is dying!”  
Their host frowned as if he didn’t appreciate Frank ruining his good mood. “Yes, yes. Bring her this way.”  
Frank carried Hazel as they followed the man farther into the building. Nico offered to help, but Frank didn’t need it. Hazel weighed nothing, and Frank’s body hummed with adrenaline. He could feel Hazel shivering, so at least he knew she was alive; but her skin was cold. Her lips had taken on a greenish tinge—or was that just Frank’s blurry vision?  
“Was it a poisonous monster that breathed in her face?” A mortal asked and Nico nodded.  
His eyes still burned from the monster’s breath. His lungs felt like he’d inhaled a flaming cabbage. He didn’t know why the gas had affected him less than it had Hazel. Maybe she’d gotten more of it in her lungs. He would have given anything to change places if it meant saving her.  
“Aww!” Aphrodite, Piper and a bunch of other girls said causing Frank to blush red like a tomato and hide his face in his hands.  
The voices of Mars and Ares yelled in his head, urging him to kill Nico and the man in denim and anyone else he could find, but Frank forced down the noise.  
The house’s front room was some sort of greenhouse. The walls were lined with tables of plant trays under fluorescent lights. The air smelled of fertilizer solution. Maybe Venetians did their gardening inside, since they were surrounded by water instead of soil? Frank wasn’t sure, but he didn’t spend much time worrying about it.  
The back room looked like a combination garage, college dorm, and computer lab. Against the left wall glowed a bank of servers and laptops, their screen savers flashing pictures of plowed fields and tractors. Against the right wall sat a single bed, a messy desk, and an open wardrobe filled with extra denim clothes and a stack of farm implements, like pitchforks and rakes.  
The back wall was a huge garage door. Parked next to it was a red-and-gold chariot with an open carriage and a single axle, like the chariots Frank had raced at Camp Jupiter. Sprouting from the sides of the driver’s box were giant feathery wings. Wrapped around the rim of the left wheel, a spotted python snored loudly.  
“Python’s snore. Good to know, Thanks Frank.” Leo said mischievously  
Frank hadn’t known that pythons could snore. He hoped he hadn’t done that himself in python form last night.  
“Set your friend here,” said the man in denim.  
Frank placed Hazel gently on the bed. He removed her sword and tried to make her comfortable, but she was as limp as a scarecrow. Her complexion definitely had a greenish tint.  
“What were those cow things?” Frank demanded. “What did they do to her?”  
“Katoblepones,” said their host. “Singular: katobleps. In English, it means down-looker. Called that because—”  
“They’re always looking down.” Nico smacked his forehead. “Right. I remember reading about them.”

“NOW YOU REMEMBER?!” All the demigods shout and Nico looked down embarrassed about how he had known about the monster.

Frank glared at him. “Now you remember?”

Nico hung his head almost as low as a katobleps. “I, uh…used to play this stupid card game when I was younger. Mythomagic. The katobleps was one of the monster cards.”

Frank blinked. “I played Mythomagic. I never saw that card.”

“Frank you played that game too, you should totally play with Nico. He still has all his cards and figures too. He never could throw them out however many times he tried to.” Percy said excitedly

“It was in the Africanus Extreme expansion deck.”

“Oh.”

Their host cleared his throat. “Are you two done, ah, geeking out, as they say?”

“Right, sorry,” Nico muttered. “Anyway, katoblepones have poison breath and a poison gaze. I thought they only lived in Africa.”

The man in denim shrugged. “That’s their native land. They were accidentally imported to Venice hundreds of years ago. You’ve heard of Saint Mark?”

Frank wanted to scream with frustration. He didn’t see how any of this was relevant, but if their host could heal Hazel, Frank decided maybe it would be best not to make him angry. “Saints? They’re not part of Greek mythology.”

The man in denim chuckled. “No, but Saint Mark is the patron saint of this city. He died in Egypt, oh, a long time ago. When the Venetians became powerful…well, the relics of saints were a big tourist attraction back in the Middle Ages. The Venetians decided to steal Saint Mark’s remains and bring them to their big church of San Marco. They smuggled out his body in a barrel of pickled pig parts.”

“Eww!” everyone said.

“That’s…disgusting,” Frank said.

“Yes,” the man agreed with a smile. “The point is, you can’t do something like that and not have consequences. The Venetians unintentionally smuggled something else out of Egypt—the katoblepones. They came here aboard that ship and have been breeding like rats ever since. They love the magical poison roots that grow here—swampy, foul-smelling plants that creep up from the canals. It makes their breath even more poisonous! Usually the monsters ignore mortals, but demigods…especially demigods who get in their way—”

“Got it,” Frank snapped. “Can you cure her?”

The man shrugged. “Possibly.”

“Possibly?” Frank had to use all his willpower not to throttle the guy.

“Oh I would totally pay to see Frank actually throttle someone!” Jason said and was making a bet with Reyna to see how far Frank will go on this guy.

He put his hand under Hazel’s nose. He couldn’t feel her breath. “Nico, please tell me she’s doing that death-trance thing, like you did in the bronze jar.”

Nico grimaced. “I don’t know if Hazel can do that. Her dad is technically Pluto, not Hades, so—”

“Hades!” cried their host. He backed away, staring at Nico with distaste. “So that’s what I smell. Children of the Underworld? If I’d known that, I would never have let you in!”

“Wow that is so rude!” Piper said instantly not liking this guy for hating on her friends.

Frank rose. “Hazel’s a good person. You promised you would help her!”

“I did not promise.”

Nico drew his sword. “She’s my sister,” he growled. “I don’t know who you are, but if you can cure her, you have to, or so help me by the River Styx—”

“Oh, blah, blah, blah!” The man waved his hand. Suddenly where Nico di Angelo had been standing was a potted plant about five feet tall, with drooping green leaves, tufts of silk, and half a dozen ripe yellow ears of corn.

“Hahahahaha!” Leo and Percy both just busted out laughing trying to imagine Nico as a very angry corn plant. Suddenly Percy had a thought that brought on another burst of laughing. “All the children of the big three have been turned into something at some point. At that a lot of people looked confused so Percy explained “Thalia was a Tree for years, I got turned into a Guinea pig by Circe in the sea of monsters when I was 13, and Nico got turned into a Corn plant.” 

“There,” the man huffed, wagging his finger at the corn plant. “Children of Hades can’t order me around! You should talk less and listen more. Now at least you have ears.”

Frank stumbled against the bed. “What did you—why—?”

The man raised an eyebrow. Frank made a squeaky noise that wasn’t very courageous. He’d been so focused on Hazel, he’d forgotten what Leo had told them about the guy they were looking for. “You’re a god,” he remembered.

“Triptolemus.” The man bowed. “My friends call me Trip, so don’t call me that. And if you’re another child of Hades—”

“Mars!” Frank said quickly. “Child of Mars!”

Triptolemus sniffed. “Well…not much better. But perhaps you deserve to be something better than a corn plant. Sorghum? Sorghum is very nice.”

“Wait!” Frank pleaded. “We’re here on a friendly mission. We brought a gift.” Very slowly, he reached into his backpack and brought out the leather-bound book. “This belongs to you?”

“My almanac!” Triptolemus grinned and seized the book. He thumbed through the pages and started bouncing on the balls of his feet. “Oh, this is fabulous! Where did you find it?”

“Um, Bologna. There were these”—Frank remembered that he wasn’t supposed to mention the dwarfs—“terrible monsters. We risked our lives, but we knew this was important to you. So could you maybe, you know, turn Nico back to normal and heal Hazel?”

“Hmm?” Trip looked up from his book. He’d been happily reciting lines to himself—something about turnip-planting schedules. Frank wished that Ella the harpy were here. She would get along great with this guy.

“Oh, heal them?” Triptolemus clucked disapprovingly. “I’m grateful for the book, of course. I can definitely let you go free, son of Mars. But I have a long-standing problem with Hades. After all, I owe my godly powers to Demeter!”

“Sometimes Gods are just jerks!” Frank muttered hoping the gods wouldn’t hear him but they did and they glared at him.

Frank racked his brain, but it was hard with the voices screaming in his head and the katobleps poison making him dizzy.

“Uh, Demeter,” he said, “the plant goddess. She—she didn’t like Hades because…” Suddenly he recalled an old story he’d heard at Camp Jupiter. “Her daughter, Proserpine—”

“Persephone,” Trip corrected. “I prefer the Greek, if you don’t mind.”

Kill him! Mars screamed.

I love this guy! Ares yelled back. Kill him anyway!

All the demigods just sighed because Frank had some annoying gods in his head.

Frank decided not to take offense. He didn’t want to get turned into a sorghum plant. “Okay. Hades kidnapped Persephone.”

“Exactly!” Trip said.

“So…Persephone was a friend of yours?”

Trip snorted. “I was just a mortal prince back then. Persephone wouldn’t have noticed me. But when her mother, Demeter, went searching for her, scouring the whole earth, not many people would help her. Hecate lit her way at night with her torches. And I…well, when Demeter came to my part of Greece, I gave her a place to stay. I comforted her, gave her a meal, and offered my assistance. I didn’t know she was a goddess at the time, but my good deed paid off. Later, Demeter rewarded me by making me a god of farming!”

“Wow,” Frank said. “Farming. Congratulations.”

“I know! Pretty awesome, right? Anyway, Demeter never got along with Hades. So naturally, you know, I have to side with my patron goddess. Children of Hades—forget it! In fact, one of them—this Scythian king named Lynkos? When I tried to teach his countrymen about farming, he killed my right python!”

“Your…right python?”

Trip marched over to his winged chariot and hopped in. He pulled a lever, and the wings began to flap. The spotted python on the left wheel opened his eyes. He started to writhe, coiling around the axle like a spring. The chariot whirred into motion, but the right wheel stayed in place, so Triptolemus spun in circles, the chariot beating its wings and bouncing up and down like a defective merry-go-round.

“You see?” he said as he spun. “No good! Ever since I lost my right python, I haven’t been able to spread the word about farming—at least not in person. Now I have to resort to giving online courses.”

Who would want to take an online class about Farming?” Jason asked and since no one answered he assumed that meant no one.

“What?” As soon as he said it, Frank was sorry he’d asked.

Trip hopped off the chariot while it was still spinning. The python slowed to a stop and went back to snoring. Trip jogged over to the line of computers. He tapped the keyboards and the screens woke up, displaying a Web site in maroon and gold, with a picture of a happy farmer in a toga and a John Deere cap, standing with his bronze scythe in a field of wheat.

“Triptolemus Farming University!” he announced proudly. “In just six weeks, you can get your bachelor’s degree in the exciting and vibrant career of the future—farming!”

Frank felt a bead of sweat trickle down his cheek. He didn’t care about this crazy god or his snake-powered chariot or his online degree program. But Hazel was turning greener by the moment. Nico was a corn plant. And he was alone.

“I can't believe I am saying this, but yeah all of those things sound way more important than his online college courses” Annabeth said. Percy just kissed her head to calm her down.

“Look,” he said. “We did bring you the almanac. And my friends are really nice. They’re not like those other children of Hades you’ve met. So if there’s any way—”

“Oh!” Trip snapped his fingers. “I see where you’re going!”

“Uh…you do?”

“Absolutely! If I cure your friend Hazel and return the other one, Nicholas—”

“Nico.”

“—if I return him to normal…”

Frank hesitated. “Yes?”

“Then in exchange, you stay with me and take up farming! A child of Mars as my apprentice? It’s perfect! What a spokesman you’ll be. We can beat swords into plowshares and have so much fun!”

“Actually…” Frank tried frantically to come up with a plan. Ares and Mars screamed in his head, Swords! Guns! Massive ka-booms!

“Yeah, that would make it hard to focus on anything” Hazel commented sadly for her boyfriend.

If he declined Trip’s offer, Frank figured he would offend the guy and end up as sorghum or wheat or some other cash crop.

If it was the only way to save Hazel, then sure, he could agree to Trip’s demands and become a farmer. But that couldn’t be the only way. Frank refused to believe he’d been chosen by the Fates to go on this quest just so he could take online courses in turnip cultivation.

Frank’s eyes wandered to the broken chariot. “I have a better offer,” he blurted out. “I can fix that.”

Trip’s smile melted. “Fix…my chariot?”

“Wait Frank the clumsy demigod is going to fix something” Leo asked sceptically.

Frank wanted to kick himself. What was he thinking? He wasn’t Leo. He couldn’t even figure out a stupid pair of Chinese handcuffs. He could barely change the batteries in a TV remote. He couldn’t fix a magical chariot!

But something told him it was his only chance. That chariot was the one thing Triptolemus might really want.

“I’ll go find a way to fix the chariot,” he said. “In return, you fix Nico and Hazel. Let us go in peace. And—and give us whatever aid you can to defeat Gaea’s forces.”

Triptolemus laughed. “What makes you think I can aid you with that?”

“Hecate told us so,” Frank said. “She sent us here. She—she decided Hazel is one of her favorites.”

“Good move Frank!” Reyna said proud of her colleague.

The color drained from Trip’s face. “Hecate?”

Frank hoped he wasn’t overstating things. He didn’t need Hecate mad at him too. But if Triptolemus and Hecate were both friends of Demeter, maybe that would convince Trip to help.

“The goddess guided us to your almanac in Bologna,” Frank said. “She wanted us to return it to you, because…well, she must’ve known you had some knowledge that would help us get through the House of Hades in Epirus.”  
Trip nodded slowly. “Yes. I see. I know why Hecate sent you to me. Very well, son of Mars. Go find a way to fix my chariot. If you succeed, I will do all you ask. If not—”  
“Your friends will die and all that threatening jazz” Percy said nonchalantly   
“I know,” Frank grumbled. “My friends die.”  
“Yes,” Trip said cheerfully. “And you’ll make a lovely patch of sorghum!”  
“Done” Athena said handling the book to Annabeth to read next.


	22. Frank XX

FRANK STUMBLED OUT OF THE BLACK HOUSE. The door shut behind him, and he collapsed against the wall, overcome with guilt. Fortunately the katoblepones had cleared off, or he might have just sat there and let them trample him. He deserved nothing better. He’d left Hazel inside, dying and defenseless, at the mercy of a crazy farmer god.  
“Trip isn’t crazy he is just a little eccentric” Demeter commented making the demigods all just roll their eyes.  
Kill farmers! Ares screamed in his head.  
Return to the legion and fight Greeks! Mars said. What are we doing here?  
Killing farmers! Ares screamed back.  
“Ares why must you always resort to killing everything? It is not healthy.” Hera said to her son while Ares just pouted and replied “Because it is fun.”  
“Shut up!” Frank yelled aloud. “Both of you!”  
“Whoa Frank I didn’t know you had the guts to yell at a god, let alone two who just happen to be your dad the god of war” Percy said giving Frank an approving nod that Frank returned with a sheepish smile. Ares just pouted again at having to be yelled at by his son.  
A couple of old ladies with shopping bags shuffled past. They gave Frank a strange look, muttered something in Italian, and kept going.  
“You probably looked like you were a crazy, insane, psychopath or something” Leo said while laughing.   
Frank stared miserably at Hazel’s cavalry sword, lying at his feet next to his backpack. He could run back to the Argo II and get Leo. Maybe Leo could fix the chariot.  
“If it runs on python power, nope.” Leo said  
But Frank somehow knew this wasn’t a problem for Leo. It was Frank’s task. He had to prove himself. Besides, the chariot wasn’t exactly broken. There was no mechanical problem. It was missing a serpent.  
Frank could turn himself into a python. When he’d woken up that morning as a giant snake, perhaps it had been a sign from the gods. He didn’t want to spend the rest of his life turning the wheel of a farmer’s chariot, but if it meant saving Hazel…  
“There is almost always another way than sacrificing yourself, Leo is the exception” Piper said to Frank and the mortals just looked confused. “Um... Did you just say Leo was the exception to sacrificing yourself?” Lucy asked hesitantly. “I died sacrificing myself” Leo said like it was totally a normal thing.  
No. There had to be another way.  
Serpents, Frank thought. Mars.  
Did his father have some connection to snakes? Mars’s sacred animal was the wild boar, not the serpent. Still, Frank was sure he’d heard something once.…

He could think of only one person to ask. Reluctantly, he opened his mind to the voices of the war god.  
I need a snake, he told them. How?  
Ha, ha! Ares screamed. Yes, the serpent!  
Like that vile Cadmus, Mars said. We punished him for killing our dragon!  
They both started yelling, until Frank thought his brain would split in half.  
“Okay! Stop!”  
The voices quieted.  
“Cadmus,” Frank muttered. “Cadmus…”  
The story came back to him. The demigod Cadmus had slain a dragon that happened to be a child of Ares. How Ares had ended up with a dragon for a son, Frank didn’t want to know; but as punishment for the dragon’s death, Ares turned Cadmus into a snake.  
“Jeez that was harsh, I mean if your son was a dragon than he was probably killing people and causing a lot of problems. It is natural to kill it so it would stop.” Annabeth said to Ares.  
“So you can turn your enemies into snakes,” Frank said. “That’s what I need. I need to find an enemy. Then I need you to turn him into a snake.”  
You think I would do that for you? Ares roared. You have not proven your worth!  
Only the greatest hero could ask such a boon, Mars said. A hero like Romulus!  
Too Roman! Ares shouted. Diomedes!  
Never! Mars shouted back. That coward fell to Heracles!  
Horatius, then, Ares suggested.  
Mars went silent. Frank sensed a grudging agreement.  
“Horatius,” Frank said. “Fine. If that’s what it takes, I’ll prove I’m as good as Horatius. Uh…what did he do?”  
“My question exactly” Percy said.  
Images flooded into Frank’s mind. He saw a lone warrior standing on a stone bridge, facing an entire army massed on the far side of the Tiber River.  
Frank remembered the legend. Horatius, the Roman general, had single-handedly held off a horde of invaders, sacrificing himself on that bridge to keep the barbarians from crossing the Tiber. By giving his fellow Romans time to finish their defenses, he’d saved the Republic.  
“Wait, Horatius sacrificed himself. Frank don’t sacrifice yourself.” Hazel said worriedly clinging to Franks arm.  
Venice is overrun, Mars said, as Rome was about to be. Cleanse it!  
Destroy them all! Ares said. Put them to the sword!  
Frank pushed the voices to the back of his mind. He looked at his hands and was amazed they weren’t trembling.  
For the first time in days, his thoughts were clear. He knew exactly what he needed to do. He didn’t know how he would pull it off. The odds of dying were excellent, but he had to try. Hazel’s life depended on him.  
He strapped Hazel’s sword to his belt, morphed his backpack into a quiver and bow, and raced toward the piazza where he’d fought the cow monsters.  
The plan had three phases: dangerous, really dangerous, and insanely dangerous.  
“Like every good demigod plan” Reyna said already approving of her colleagues plan.  
Frank stopped at the old stone well. No katoblepones in sight. He drew Hazel’s sword and used it to pry up some cobblestones, unearthing a big tangle of spiky roots. The tendrils unfurled, exuding their stinky green fumes as they crept toward Frank’s feet.  
In the distance, a katobleps’s foghorn moan filled the air. Others joined in from all different directions. Frank wasn’t sure how the monsters could tell he was harvesting their favorite food—maybe they just had an excellent sense of smell.  
He had to move fast now. He sliced off a long cluster of vines and laced them through one of his belt loops, trying to ignore the burning and itching in his hands. Soon he had a glowing, stinking lasso of poisonous weeds. Hooray.  
The first few katoblepones lumbered into the piazza, bellowing in anger. Green eyes glowed under their manes. Their long snouts blew clouds of gas, like furry steam engines.  
Frank nocked an arrow. He had a momentary pang of guilt. These were not the worst monsters he’d met. They were basically grazing animals that happened to be poisonous.  
All the demigods looked down at the thought that not all the monsters were bad and tried to kill them, but they had killed them anyway.  
Hazel is dying because of them, he reminded himself.  
He let the arrow fly. The nearest katobleps collapsed, crumbling to dust. He nocked a second arrow, but the rest of the herd was almost on top of him. More were charging into the square from the opposite direction.  
Frank turned into a lion. He roared defiantly and leaped toward the archway, straight over the heads of the second herd. The two groups of katoblepones slammed into each other, but quickly recovered and ran after him.  
Frank hadn’t been sure the roots would still smell when he changed form. Usually his clothes and possessions just sort of melted into his animal shape, but apparently he still smelled like a yummy poison dinner. Each time he raced past a katobleps, it roared with outrage and joined the Kill Frank! Parade.  
He turned onto a larger street and pushed through the crowds of tourists. What the mortals saw, he had no idea—a cat being chased by a pack of dogs? People cursed at Frank in about twelve different languages. Gelato cones went flying. A woman spilled a stack of carnival masks. One dude toppled into the canal.  
Frank winced at all the damage he was causing.  
When Frank glanced back, he had at least two dozen monsters on his tail, but he needed more. He needed all the monsters in Venice, and he had to keep the ones behind him enraged.  
He found an open spot in the crowd and turned back into a human. He drew Hazel’s spatha—never his preferred weapon, but he was big enough and strong enough that the heavy cavalry sword didn’t bother him. In fact he was glad for the extra reach. He slashed the golden blade, destroying the first katobleps and letting the others bunch up in front of him.  
He tried to avoid their eyes, but he could feel their gaze burning into him. He figured that if all these monsters breathed on him at once, their combined noxious cloud would be enough to melt him into a puddle. The monsters crowded forward and slammed into one another.  
Frank yelled, “You want my poison roots? Come and get them!”  
He turned into a dolphin and jumped into the canal. He hoped katoblepones couldn’t swim. At the very least, they seemed reluctant to follow him in, and he couldn’t blame them. The canal was disgusting—smelly and salty and as warm as soup—but Frank forged through it, dodging gondolas and speedboats, pausing occasionally to chitter dolphin insults at the monsters who followed him on the sidewalks. When he reached the nearest gondola dock, Frank turned back into a human again, stabbed a few more katoblepones to keep them angry, and took off running.  
“Wow that is like so amazing Frank! You told us what you did but actually hearing about it, just wow.” Hazel said eyes shining in pride for her boyfriend.  
So it went.  
After a while, Frank fell into a kind of daze. He attracted more monsters, scattered more crowds of tourists, and led his now massive following of katoblepones through the winding streets of the old city. Whenever he needed a quick escape, he dove into a canal as a dolphin, or turned into an eagle and soared overhead, but he never got too far ahead of his pursuers.  
Whenever he felt like the monsters might be losing interest, he stopped on a rooftop and drew his bow, picking off a few of the katoblepones in the center of the herd. He shook his lasso of poison vines and insulted the monsters’ bad breath, stirring them into a fury. Then he continued the race.  
He backtracked. He lost his way. Once he turned a corner and ran into the tail end of his own monster mob. He should have been exhausted, yet somehow he found the strength to keep going—which was good. The hardest part was yet to come.  
He spotted a couple of bridges, but they didn’t look right. One was elevated and completely covered; no way could he get the monsters to funnel through it. Another was too crowded with tourists. Even if the monsters ignored the mortals, that noxious gas couldn’t be good for anyone to breathe. The bigger the monster herd got, the more mortals would get pushed aside, knocked into the water, or trampled.  
Finally Frank saw something that would work. Just ahead, past a big piazza, a wooden bridge spanned one of the widest canals. The bridge itself was a latticed arc of timber, like an old-fashioned roller coaster, about fifty meters long.  
From above, in eagle form, Frank saw no monsters on the far side. Every katobleps in Venice seemed to have joined the herd and was pushing through the streets behind him as tourists screamed and scattered, maybe thinking they were caught in the midst of a stray dog stampede.  
The bridge was empty of foot traffic. It was perfect.  
Frank dropped like a stone and turned back to human form. He ran to the middle of the bridge—a natural choke point—and threw his bait of poisonous roots on the deck behind him.  
As the front of the katobleps herd reached the base of the bridge, Frank drew Hazel’s golden spatha.  
“Come on!” he yelled. “You want to know what Frank Zhang is worth? Come on!”  
“You are worth a lot more than you give yourself credit for even without doing this.” Jason said  
He realized he wasn’t just shouting at the monsters. He was venting weeks of fear, rage, and resentment. The voices of Mars and Ares screamed right along with him.  
The monsters charged. Frank’s vision turned red.  
Later, he couldn’t remember the details clearly. He sliced through monsters until he was ankle-deep in yellow dust. Whenever he got overwhelmed and the clouds of gas began to choke him, he changed shape—became an elephant, a dragon, a lion—and each transformation seemed to clear his lungs, giving him a fresh burst of energy. His shape-shifting became so fluid, he could start an attack in human form with his sword and finish as a lion, raking his claws across a katobleps’s snout.  
The monsters kicked with their hooves. They breathed noxious gas and glared straight at Frank with their poisonous eyes. He should have died. He should have been trampled. But somehow, he stayed on his feet, unharmed, and unleashed a hurricane of violence.  
He didn’t feel any sort of pleasure in this, but he didn’t hesitate, either. He stabbed one monster and beheaded another. He turned into a dragon and bit a katobleps in half, then changed into an elephant and trampled three at once under his feet. His vision was still tinted red, and he realized his eyes weren’t playing tricks on him. He was actually glowing—surrounded by a rosy aura.  
He didn’t understand why, but he kept fighting until there was only one monster left.  
All the demigods looked at Frank with really proud looks in their eyes because Frank had done better than they could have done and he was their friend and comrade.  
Frank faced it with his sword drawn. He was out of breath, sweaty, and caked in monster dust, but he was unharmed.  
The katobleps snarled. It must not have been the smartest monster. Despite the fact that several hundred of its brethren had just died, it did not back down.  
“Mars!” Frank yelled. “I’ve proven myself. Now I need a snake!”  
Frank doubted anyone had ever shouted those words before. It was kind of a weird request. He got no answer from the skies. For once, the voices in his head were silent.  
The katobleps lost patience. It launched itself at Frank and left him no choice. He slashed upward. As soon as his blade hit the monster, the katobleps disappeared in a flash of blood-red light. When Frank’s vision cleared, a mottled brown Burmese python was coiled at his feet.  
“Well done,” said a familiar voice.  
“You invoked Mars” Nico said  
Standing a few feet away was his dad, Mars, wearing a red beret and olive fatigues with the insignia of the Italian Special Forces, an assault rifle slung over his shoulder. His face was hard and angular, his eyes covered with dark sunglasses.  
“Father,” Frank managed.  
He couldn’t believe what he’d just done. The terror started to catch up to him. He felt like sobbing, but he guessed that would not be a good idea in front of Mars.  
All the demigods laughed at Frank  
“It’s natural to feel fear.” The war god’s voice was surprisingly warm, full of pride. “All great warriors are afraid. Only the stupid and the delusional are not. But you faced your fear, my son. You did what you had to do, like Horatius. This was your bridge, and you defended it.”  
“I—” Frank wasn’t sure what to say. “I…I just needed a snake.”  
A tiny smile tugged at Mars’s mouth. “Yes. And now you have one. Your bravery has united my forms, Greek and Roman, if only for a moment. Go. Save your friends. But hear me, Frank. Your greatest test is yet to come. When you face the armies of Gaea at Epirus, your leadership—”  
Suddenly the god doubled over, clutching his head. His form flickered. His fatigues turned into a toga, then a biker’s jacket and jeans. His rifle changed into a sword and then a rocket launcher.  
“Agony!” Mars bellowed. “Go! Hurry!”  
Frank didn’t ask questions. Despite his exhaustion, he turned into a giant eagle, snatched up the python in his massive claws, and launched himself into the air.  
When he glanced back, a miniature mushroom cloud erupted from the middle of the bridge, rings of fire washing outward, and a pair of voices—Mars and Ares—screamed, “Noooo!”  
Frank wasn’t sure what had just happened, but he had no time to think about it. He flew over the city—now completely empty of monsters—and headed for the house of Triptolemus.  
“You found one!” the farmer god exclaimed.  
Frank ignored him. He stormed into La Casa Nera, dragging the python by its tail like a very strange Santa Claus bag, and dropped it next to the bed.  
He knelt at Hazel’s side.  
She was still alive—green and shivering, barely breathing, but alive. As for Nico, he was still a corn plant.  
“Heal them,” Frank said. “Now.”  
Triptolemus crossed his arms. “How do I know the snake will work?”  
“Duh it was a gift from the gods!”  
Frank gritted his teeth. Since the explosion on the bridge, the voices of the war god had gone silent in his head, but he still felt their combined anger churning inside him. He felt physically different, too. Had Triptolemus gotten shorter?  
“Why would you assume he got shorter?” Serena asked Frank curiously. “Actually, I got taller” Frank responded  
“The snake is a gift from Mars,” Frank growled. “It will work.”  
As if on cue, the Burmese python slithered over to the chariot and wrapped itself around the right wheel. The other snake woke up. The two serpents checked each other out, touching noses, then turned their wheels in unison. The chariot inched forward, its wings flapping.  
“You see?” Frank said. “Now, heal my friends!”  
Triptolemus tapped his chin. “Well, thank you for the snake, but I’m not sure I like your tone, demigod. Perhaps I’ll turn you into—”  
Frank was faster. He lunged at Trip and slammed him into the wall, his fingers locked around the god’s throat.  
“Think about your next words,” Frank warned, deadly calm. “Or instead of beating my sword into a plowshare, I will beat it into your head.”  
“Wow Frank being so violent is definitely scary, I am glad you aren’t always like that.” Piper said with a sigh of relief.  
Triptolemus gulped. “You know…I think I’ll heal your friends.”  
“Swear it on the River Styx.”  
“I swear it on the River Styx.”  
“Always make them promise on the River Styx.” Percy said glaring at Hades  
Frank released him. Triptolemus touched his throat, as if making sure it was still there. He gave Frank a nervous smile, edged around him, and scurried off to the front room. “Just—just gathering herbs!”  
Frank watched as the god picked leaves and roots and crushed them in a mortar. He rolled a pill-sized ball of green goop and jogged to Hazel’s side. He placed the gunk ball under Hazel’s tongue.

Instantly, she shuddered and sat up, coughing. Her eyes flew open. The greenish tint in her skin disappeared.  
She looked around, bewildered, until she saw Frank. “What—?”  
Frank tackled her in a hug. “You’re going to be fine,” he said fiercely. “Everything is fine.”  
“But…” Hazel gripped his shoulders and stared at him in amazement. “Frank, what happened to you?”  
“I was so confused and worried when I just woke up and saw him their, I almost had a heart attack!” Hazel commented.  
“To me?” He stood, suddenly self-conscious. “I don’t…”  
He looked down and realized what she meant. Triptolemus hadn’t gotten shorter. Frank was taller. His gut had shrunk. His chest seemed bulkier.  
Frank had had growth spurts before. Once he’d woken up two centimeters taller than when he’d gone to sleep. But this was nuts. It was as if some of the dragon and lion had stayed with him when he’d turned back to human.  
“That is still so cool and unfair that you can turn into animals and I can’t. Dad why didn’t you give me that ability too, it's so cool!?” Percy whined to his dad who just chuckled to himself and didn’t answer.  
“Uh…I don’t…Maybe I can fix it.”  
“Really Frank, Why would you ever want to fix it?” Leo said shocked. “I would give anything to be tall and bulky like you and all of my other siblings!” Leo slumped down in his chair.  
Hazel laughed with delight. “Why? You look amazing!”  
“I—I do?”  
“I mean, you were handsome before! But you look older, and taller, and so distinguished—”  
Frank blushed bright red and covered his face with his hands.  
Triptolemus heaved a dramatic sigh. “Yes, obviously some sort of blessing from Mars. Congratulations, blah, blah, blah. Now, if we’re done here…?”  
Frank glared at him. “We’re not done. Heal Nico.”  
“Wow, I you all totally forgot I got turned into a corn plant,” Nico huffed indignantly.  
The farm god rolled his eyes. He pointed at the corn plant, and BAM! Nico di Angelo appeared in an explosion of corn silk.  
Nico looked around in a panic. “I—I had the weirdest nightmare about popcorn.” He frowned at Frank. “Why are you taller?”  
All the demigod burst out laughing at Nico while he just blushed and hid in a nearby shadow. Even Hades was chuckling at his son’s reaction.  
“Everything’s fine,” Frank promised. “Triptolemus was about to tell us how to survive the House of Hades. Weren’t you, Trip?”  
The farm god raised his eyes to the ceiling, like, Why me, Demeter?  
“Fine,” Trip said. “When you arrive at Epirus, you will be offered a chalice to drink from.”  
“Offered by whom?” Nico asked.  
“Doesn’t matter,” Trip snapped. “Just know that it is filled with deadly poison.”  
Hazel shuddered. “So you’re saying that we shouldn’t drink it.”  
“No!” Trip said. “You must drink it, or you’ll never be able to make it through the temple. The poison connects you to the world of the dead, lets you pass into the lower levels. The secret to surviving is”—his eyes twinkled—“barley.”  
“Barley is the secret to surviving deadly poison?” A science teacher asked sarcastically. “Yep” was the only reply.  
Frank stared at him. “Barley.”  
“In the front room, take some of my special barley. Make it into little cakes. Eat these before you step into the House of Hades. The barley will absorb the worst of the poison, so it will affect you, but not kill you.”  
“That’s it?” Nico demanded. “Hecate sent us halfway across Italy so you could tell us to eat barley?”  
“Good luck!” Triptolemus sprinted across the room and hopped in his chariot. “And, Frank Zhang, I forgive you! You’ve got spunk. If you ever change your mind, my offer is open. I’d love to see you get a degree in farming!”  
“Yeah,” Frank muttered. “Thanks.”  
The god pulled a lever on his chariot. The snake-wheels turned. The wings flapped. At the back of the room, the garage doors rolled open.  
“Oh, to be mobile again!” Trip cried. “So many ignorant lands in need of my knowledge. I will teach them the glories of tilling, irrigation, fertilizing!” The chariot lifted off and zipped out of the house, Triptolemus shouting to the sky, “Away, my serpents! Away!”  
“That,” Hazel said, “was very strange.”  
“Agreed” All the mortals said while the demigods just shrugged since they had seen a lot of strange things. “Strange is the new normal, you get used to it” Jason said.  
“The glories of fertilizing.” Nico brushed some corn silk off his shoulder. “Can we get out of here now?”  
Hazel put her hand on Frank’s shoulder. “Are you okay, really? You bartered for our lives. What did Triptolemus make you do?”  
Frank tried to hold it together. He scolded himself for feeling so weak. He could face an army of monsters, but as soon as Hazel showed him kindness, he wanted to break down and cry. “Those cow monsters…the katoblepones that poisoned you…I had to destroy them.”  
“That was brave,” Nico said. “There must have been, what, six or seven left in that herd.”  
“We were really surprised” Nico said.  
“No.” Frank cleared his throat. “All of them. I killed all of them in the city.”  
Nico and Hazel stared at him in stunned silence. Frank was afraid they might doubt him, or start to laugh. How many monsters had he killed on that bridge—two hundred? Three hundred?  
But he saw in their eyes that they believed him. They were children of the Underworld. Maybe they could sense the death and carnage he’d unleashed.  
“We could” They said simultaneously.  
Hazel kissed his cheek. She had to stand on her tiptoes to do it now. Her eyes were incredibly sad, as if she realized something had changed in Frank—something much more important than the physical growth spurt.  
Frank knew it too. He would never be the same. He just wasn’t sure if that was a good thing.  
“Well,” Nico said, breaking the tension, “does anyone know what barley looks like?”  
“I’m done reading” Annabeth said while handing the book to Percy to read next.


	23. Annabeth XXI

“This is a chapter from Annabeth’s point of view, do you think you will be ok?” Percy asked Annabeth cautiously she nodded and he started to read voice shaking a little as he started.  
ANNABETH DECIDED THE MONSTERS wouldn’t kill her. Neither would the poisonous atmosphere, nor the treacherous landscape with its pits, cliffs, and jagged rocks.  
“Well that would be a good mindset to have.” Reyna commented dryly.  
Nope. Most likely she would die from an overload of weirdness that would make her brain explode.  
All the demigods started laughing. It was definitely a possibility.  
First, she and Percy had had to drink fire to stay alive. Then they were attacked by a gaggle of vampires, led by a cheerleader Annabeth had killed two years ago. Finally, they were rescued by a Titan janitor named Bob who had Einstein hair, silver eyes, and wicked broom skills.  
“That is really weird even by demigod standards.” Leo said mystified  
Sure. Why not?  
They followed Bob through the wasteland, tracing the route of the Phlegethon as they approached the storm front of darkness. Every so often they stopped to drink firewater, which kept them alive, but Annabeth wasn’t happy about it. Her throat felt like she was constantly gargling with battery acid.  
Her only comfort was Percy. Every so often he would glance over and smile, or squeeze her hand. He had to be just as scared and miserable as she was, and she loved him for trying to make her feel better.  
Annabeth snuggled into his arm as he kept reading causing him to smile.  
“Bob knows what he’s doing,” Percy promised.  
“You have interesting friends,” Annabeth murmured.  
“Hey!” everyone who was friends with Percy including some of the gods (Apollo and Hermes) said indignantly.  
“Bob is interesting!” The Titan turned and grinned. “Yes, thank you!”  
The big guy had good ears. Annabeth would have to remember that.  
Athena nodded her head at Annabeth approving of what she was doing.  
“So, Bob…” She tried to sound casual and friendly, which wasn’t easy with a throat scorched by firewater. “How did you get to Tartarus?”  
“I jumped,” he said, like it was obvious.  
“You jumped into Tartarus,” she said, “because Percy said your name?”  
“He needed me.” Those silver eyes gleamed in the darkness. “It is okay. I was tired of sweeping the palace. Come along! We are almost at a rest stop.”  
A rest stop.  
“There are rest stops in Tartarus?” Frank asked confused. “Well kind of... you’ll see what I mean in a minute” Annabeth answered cryptically.  
Annabeth couldn’t imagine what those words meant in Tartarus. She remembered all the times she, Luke, and Thalia had relied on highway rest stops when they were homeless demigods, trying to survive.  
Jason looked down at the mention of his sister after she thought he was dead.  
Wherever Bob was taking them, she hoped it had clean restrooms and a snack machine. She repressed the giggles. Yes, she was definitely losing it.  
Annabeth hobbled along, trying to ignore the rumble in her stomach. She stared at Bob’s back as he led them toward the wall of darkness, now only a few hundred yards away. His blue janitor’s coveralls were ripped between the shoulder blades, as if someone had tried to stab him. Cleaning rags stuck out of his pocket. A squirt bottle swung from his belt, the blue liquid inside sloshing hypnotically.  
Annabeth remembered Percy’s story about meeting the Titan. Thalia Grace, Nico di Angelo, and Percy had worked together to defeat Bob on the banks of the Lethe. After wiping his memory, they didn’t have the heart to kill him. He became so gentle and sweet and cooperative that they left him at the palace of Hades, where Persephone promised he would be looked after.  
All the gods and demigods looked at Hades and glared at him. They had turned him into a janitor to clean up after them.  
Apparently, the Underworld king and queen thought “looking after” someone meant giving him a broom and having him sweep up their messes. Annabeth wondered how even Hades could be so callous. She’d never felt sorry for a Titan before, but it didn’t seem right taking a brainwashed immortal and turning him into an unpaid janitor.  
He’s not your friend, she reminded herself.  
She was terrified that Bob would suddenly remember himself. Tartarus was where monsters came to regenerate. What if it healed his memory? If he became Iapetus again…well, Annabeth had seen the way he had dealt with those empousai. Annabeth had no weapon. She and Percy were in no condition to fight a Titan.  
She glanced nervously at Bob’s broom handle, wondering how long it would be before that hidden spearhead jutted out and got pointed at her.  
“Never” Both Percy and Annabeth muttered but everyone heard them anyway. They both looked like they were going to cry.  
Following Bob through Tartarus was a crazy risk. Unfortunately, she couldn’t think of a better plan.  
They picked their way across the ashen wasteland as red lightning flashed overhead in the poisonous clouds. Just another lovely day in the dungeon of creation. Annabeth couldn’t see far in the hazy air, but the longer they walked, the more certain she became that the entire landscape was a downward curve.  
She’d heard conflicting descriptions of Tartarus. It was a bottomless pit. It was a fortress surrounded by brass walls. It was nothing but an endless void.  
One story described it as the inverse of the sky—a huge, hollow, upside-down dome of rock. That seemed the most accurate, though if Tartarus was a dome, Annabeth guessed it was like the sky—with no real bottom but made of multiple layers, each one darker and less hospitable than the last.  
And even that wasn’t the full, horrible truth.…  
They passed a blister in the ground—a writhing, translucent bubble the size of a minivan. Curled inside was the half-formed body of a drakon. Bob speared the blister without a second thought. It burst in a geyser of steaming yellow slime, and the drakon dissolved into nothing.  
Bob kept walking.  
Monsters are zits on the skin of Tartarus, Annabeth thought. She shuddered. Sometimes she wished she didn’t have such a good imagination, because now she was certain they were walking across a living thing. This whole twisted landscape—the dome, pit, or whatever you called it—was the body of the god Tartarus—the most ancient incarnation of evil. Just as Gaea inhabited the surface of the earth, Tartarus inhabited the pit.  
“That isn’t just your imagination unfortunately” Nico said darkly and both Percy and Annabeth nodded as they had already long since figured that out.  
If that god noticed them walking across his skin, like fleas on a dog…Enough. No more thinking.  
“Here,” Bob said.  
They stopped at the top of a ridge. Below them, in a sheltered depression like a moon crater, stood a ring of broken black marble columns surrounding a dark stone altar.  
“Hermes’s shrine,” Bob explained.  
Percy frowned. “A Hermes shrine in Tartarus?”  
Hermes looked confused “Why would a shrine to me be in Tartarus?” Annabeth shrugged in response.  
Bob laughed in delight. “Yes. It fell from somewhere long ago. Maybe mortal world. Maybe Olympus. Anyway, monsters steer clear. Mostly.”  
“How did you know it was here?” Annabeth asked.  
Bob’s smile faded. He got a vacant look in his eyes. “Can’t remember.”  
“That’s okay,” Percy said quickly.  
Annabeth felt like kicking herself. Before Bob became Bob, he had been Iapetus the Titan. Like all his brethren, he’d been imprisoned in Tartarus for eons. Of course he knew his way around. If he remembered this shrine, he might start recalling other details of his old prison and his old life. That would not be good.  
“I was so mean to him” Annabeth whispered to Percy he nodded but he could tell that she was feeling really guilty about it. “It’s ok, he knew you didn’t hate hi in the end.” Percy tried to calm her down and started to rub her back soothingly.  
They climbed into the crater and entered the circle of columns. Annabeth collapsed on a broken slab of marble, too exhausted to take another step. Percy stood over her protectively, scanning their surroundings. The inky storm front was less than a hundred feet away now, obscuring everything ahead of them. The crater’s rim blocked their view of the wasteland behind. They’d be well hidden here, but if monsters did stumble across them, they would have no warning.  
“You said someone was chasing us,” Annabeth said. “Who?”  
Bob swept his broom around the base of the altar, occasionally crouching to study the ground as if looking for something. “They are following, yes. They know you are here. Giants and Titans. The defeated ones. They know.”  
Everyone tensed. They were being hunted by titan’s and giants, that was not good.  
The defeated ones…  
Annabeth tried to control her fear. How many Titans and giants had she and Percy fought over the years? Each one had seemed like an impossible challenge. If all of them were down here in Tartarus, and if they were actively hunting Percy and Annabeth…  
“Why are we stopping, then?” she said. “We should keep moving.”  
“Soon,” Bob said. “But mortals need rest. Good place here. Best place for…oh, long, long way. I will guard you.”  
Annabeth glanced at Percy, sending him the silent message: Uh, no. Hanging out with a Titan was bad enough. Going to sleep while the Titan guarded you…she didn’t need to be a daughter of Athena to know that was one hundred percent unwise.  
Annabeth started to cry. She missed Bob and she had been so mean and suspicious for most of the time she had known him. She had just left him there in Tartarus to sacrifice himself to save them. She couldn’t hold back the tears anymore, Percy just held her knowing exactly what she was feeling. All of the other demigods looked at them worriedly at Annabeth’s reaction to someone she seemed to not like.  
“You sleep,” Percy told her. “I’ll keep the first watch with Bob.”  
Bob rumbled in agreement. “Yes, good. When you wake, food should be here!”  
Annabeth’s stomach did a rollover at the mention of food. She didn’t see how Bob could summon food in the midst of Tartarus. Maybe he was a caterer as well as a janitor.  
She didn’t want to sleep, but her body betrayed her. Her eyelids turned to lead. “Percy, wake me for second watch. Don’t be a hero.”  
He gave her that smirk she’d come to love. “Who, me?”  
“He isn’t going to wake you up.” all the demigods said.  
He kissed her, his lips parched and feverishly warm. “Sleep.”

Annabeth felt like she was back in the Hypnos cabin at Camp Half-Blood, overcome with drowsiness. She curled up on the hard ground and closed her eyes.  
“Ok I finished reading, who wants to read next?” Percy asked. Paul raised his hand so Percy passed the book to him.


	24. Annabeth XXII

LATER, SHE MADE A RESOLUTION: Never EVER sleep in Tartarus.  
Demigod dreams were always bad. Even in the safety of her bunk at camp, she’d had horrible nightmares. In Tartarus, they were a thousand times more vivid.  
“Oh, gods. I can’t even imagine those dreams being any worse than they already are.” Thalia said nervously  
First, she was a little girl again, struggling to climb Half-Blood Hill. Luke Castellan held her hand, pulling her along. Their satyr guide Grover Underwood pranced nervously at the summit, yelling, “Hurry! Hurry!”  
“Not that again!” Thalia said dreading her brother having to hear this.  
Thalia Grace stood behind them, holding back an army of hellhounds with her terror-invoking shield, Aegis.  
From the top of the hill, Annabeth could see the camp in the valley below—the warm lights of the cabins, the possibility of sanctuary. She stumbled, twisting her ankle, and Luke scooped her up to carry her. When they looked back, the monsters were only a few yards away—dozens of them surrounding Thalia.  
Jason tensed next to Piper.  
“Go!” Thalia yelled. “I’ll hold them off.”  
She brandished her spear, and forked lightning slashed through the monsters’ ranks; but as the hellhounds fell, more took their place.  
Jason started to cry and Piper hugging him close and let him cry. Thalia went over and sat on her brothers other side reassuring him that she was still here.  
“We have to run!” Grover cried.  
He led the way into camp. Luke followed, with Annabeth crying, beating at his chest, and screaming that they couldn’t leave Thalia alone. But it was too late.  
The scene shifted.  
Jason had calmed down again thanks to Piper and Thalia, and was wiping his eyes dry.  
Annabeth was older, climbing to the summit of Half-Blood Hill. Where Thalia had made her last stand, a tall pine tree now rose. Overhead a storm was raging.  
Thunder shook the valley. A blast of lightning split the tree down to its roots, opening a smoking crevice. In the darkness below stood Reyna, the praetor of New Rome. Her cloak was the color of blood fresh from a vein. Her gold armor glinted. She stared up, her face regal and distant, and spoke directly into Annabeth’s mind.  
“This was that dream?” Reyna asked and Annabeth just nodded.  
You have done well, Reyna said, but the voice was Athena’s. The rest of my journey must be on the wings of Rome.  
The praetor’s dark eyes turned as gray as storm clouds.  
I must stand here, Reyna told her. The Roman must bring me.  
The hill shook. The ground rippled as the grass became folds of silk—the dress of a massive goddess. Gaea rose over Camp Half-Blood—her sleeping face as large as a mountain.  
Hellhounds poured over the hills. Giants, six-armed Earthborn, and wild Cyclopes charged from the beach, tearing down the dining pavilion, setting fire to the cabins and the Big House.  
All the demigods had a dark look in their eyes at what was in the dream making the mortals wonder if it had actually happened already and they couldn’t stop it.  
Hurry, said the voice of Athena. The message must be sent.  
The ground split at Annabeth’s feet and she fell into darkness.  
Her eyes flew open. She cried out, grasping Percy’s arms. She was still in Tartarus, at the shrine of Hermes.  
“It’s okay,” Percy promised. “Bad dreams?”  
“What else?” Nico said sarcastically. Percy just playfully stuck his tongue out at Nico.  
Her body tingled with dread. “Is it—is it my turn to watch?”  
“No, no. We’re good. I let you sleep.”  
“See!” All the demigods yelled causing Percy to blush.  
“Percy!”  
“Hey, it’s fine. Besides, I was too excited to sleep. Look.”  
Bob the Titan sat cross-legged by the altar, happily munching a piece of pizza.  
Annabeth rubbed her eyes, wondering if she was still dreaming. “Is that…pepperoni?”  
“FOOD!” Leo yelled excitedly.  
“Burnt offerings,” Percy said. “Sacrifices to Hermes from the mortal world, I guess. They appeared in a cloud of smoke. We’ve got half a hot dog, some grapes, a plate of roast beef, and a package of peanut M&M’s.”  
“That sounds like something Connor Stoll sacrifices to Hermes.” Piper commented curiously.  
“M&M’s for Bob!” Bob said happily. “Uh, that okay?”  
Annabeth didn’t protest. Percy brought her the plate of roast beef, and she wolfed it down. She’d never tasted anything so good. The brisket was still hot, with exactly the same spicy sweet glaze as the barbecue at Camp Half-Blood.  
“I know,” said Percy, reading her expression. “I think it is from Camp Half-Blood.”  
The idea made Annabeth giddy with homesickness. At every meal, the campers would burn a portion of their food to honor their godly parents. The smoke supposedly pleased the gods, but Annabeth had never thought about where the food went when it was burned. Maybe the offerings reappeared on the gods’ altars in Olympus…or even here, in the middle of Tartarus.  
“Peanut M&M’s,” Annabeth said. “Connor Stoll always burned a pack for his dad at dinner.”  
“Told you” Piper said.  
She thought about sitting in the dining pavilion, watching the sunset over Long Island Sound. That was the first place she and Percy had truly kissed. Her eyes smarted.  
“Aww!” Aphrodite said with a loud squeal.  
Percy put his hand on her shoulder. “Hey, this is good. Actual food from home, right?”  
She nodded. They finished eating in silence.  
Bob chomped down the last of his M&M’s. “Should go now. They will be here in a few minutes.”  
“Minutes!, Hurry up and leave guys!” Hazel said worriedly  
“A few minutes?” Annabeth reached for her dagger, then remembered she didn’t have it.  
“Yes…well, I think minutes…” Bob scratched his silvery hair. “Time is hard in Tartarus. Not the same.”  
“You got that right,” Percy said  
Percy crept to the edge of the crater. He peered back the way they’d come. “I don’t see anything, but that doesn’t mean much. Bob, which giants are we talking about? Which Titans?”  
Bob grunted. “Not sure of names. Six, maybe seven. I can sense them.”  
“Six or seven?” Annabeth wasn’t sure her barbecue would stay down. “And can they sense you?”  
“Don’t know.” Bob smiled. “Bob is different! But they can smell demigods, yes. You two smell very strong. Good strong. Like…hmm. Like buttery bread!”  
We smell like Buttery bread?” Frank questioned “Apparently”  
“Buttery bread,” Annabeth said. “Well, that’s great.”  
Percy climbed back to the altar. “Is it possible to kill a giant in Tartarus? I mean, since we don’t have a god to help us?”  
He looked at Annabeth as if she actually had an answer.  
“I was hoping you did” Percy said  
“Percy, I don’t know. Traveling in Tartarus, fighting monsters here…it’s never been done before. Maybe Bob could help us kill a giant? Maybe a Titan would count as a god? I just don’t know.”  
“Yeah,” Percy said. “Okay.”  
She could see the worry in his eyes. For years, he’d depended on her for answers. Now, when he needed her most, she couldn’t help. She hated being so clueless, but nothing she’d ever learned at camp had prepared her for Tartarus. There was only one thing she was sure of: they had to keep moving. They couldn’t be caught by six or seven hostile immortals.  
She stood, still disoriented from her nightmares. Bob started cleaning up, collecting their trash in a little pile, using his squirt bottle to wipe off the altar.  
“Thanks I guess,” Hermes said.  
“Where to now?” Annabeth asked.  
Percy pointed at the stormy wall of darkness. “Bob says that way. Apparently the Doors of Death—”  
“You told him?” Annabeth didn’t mean it to come out so harsh, but Percy winced.  
Annabeth started tearing up again but held them back because she knew she would make friends with him later.  
“While you were asleep,” he admitted. “Annabeth, Bob can help. We need a guide.”  
“Bob helps!” Bob agreed. “Into the Dark Lands. The Doors of Death…hmm, walking straight to them would be bad. Too many monsters gathered there. Even Bob could not sweep that many. They would kill Percy and Annabeth in about two seconds.” The Titan frowned. “I think seconds. Time is hard in Tartarus.”  
“Right,” Annabeth grumbled. “So is there another way?”  
“Hiding,” said Bob. “The Death Mist could hide you.”  
“No! No Death Mist!” All the gods yelled while Percy and Annabeth just shivered remembering the feel of the death mist around them. The mortals and other demigods looked worried and confused about what the Death Mist was.  
“Oh…” Annabeth suddenly felt very small in the shadow of the Titan. “Uh, what is Death Mist?”  
“It is dangerous,” Bob said. “But if the lady will give you Death Mist, it might hide you. If we can avoid Night. The lady is very close to Night. That is bad.”  
“Night as in Capital ‘N’ Night?” Jason asked now even more worried. Percy and Annabeth just looked at each other not saying anything.  
“The lady,” Percy repeated.  
“Yes.” Bob pointed ahead of them into the inky blackness. “We should go.”  
Percy glanced at Annabeth, obviously hoping for guidance, but she had none. She was thinking about her nightmare—Thalia’s tree splintered by lightning, Gaea rising on the hillside and unleashing her monsters on Camp Half-Blood.  
“Okay, then,” Percy said. “I guess we’ll see a lady about some Death Mist.”  
“Wait,” Annabeth said.  
Her mind was buzzing. She thought of her dream about Luke and Thalia. She recalled the stories Luke had told her about his father, Hermes—god of travelers, guide to the spirits of the dead, god of communication.  
She stared at the black altar.  
“Annabeth?” Percy sounded concerned.  
She walked to the pile of trash and picked out a reasonably clean paper napkin.  
“What are you planning?” Thalia asked since she was the only one who didn’t know about the message yet. “Just watch” Jason said.  
She remembered her vision of Reyna, standing in the smoking crevice beneath the ruins of Thalia’s pine tree, speaking with the voice of Athena:  
I must stand here. The Roman must bring me.  
Hurry. The message must be sent.  
“Bob,” she said, “offerings burned in the mortal world appear on this altar, right?”  
Bob frowned uncomfortably, like he wasn’t ready for a pop quiz. “Yes?”  
“So what happens if I burn something on the altar here?”  
“Oh you are going to try to send a message to camp from the shrine to send the message to Reyna. Got it.” Thalia remarked astounded once again by Annabeth’s ideas.  
“Uh…”  
“That’s all right,” Annabeth said. “You don’t know. Nobody knows, because it’s never been done.”  
There was a chance, she thought, just the slimmest chance that an offering burned on this altar might appear at Camp Half-Blood.  
Doubtful, but if it did work…  
“Annabeth?” Percy said again. “You’re planning something. You’ve got that I’m-planning-something look.”  
“I don’t have an I’m-planning-something look.”  
“Yes you do!” All the demigods yelled at Annabeth who still didn’t think she had a I’m-planning-something look.  
“Yeah, you totally do. Your eyebrows knit and your lips press together and—”  
“Do you have a pen?” she asked him.  
“You’re kidding, right?” He brought out Riptide.  
“Yes, but can you actually write with it?”  
“I—I don’t know,” he admitted. “Never tried.”  
“Of course you haven’t” Piper said sarcastically.  
He uncapped the pen. As usual, it sprang into a full-sized sword. Annabeth had watched him do this hundreds of times. Normally when he fought, Percy simply discarded the cap. It always appeared in his pocket later, as needed. When he touched the cap to the point of the sword, it would turn back into a ballpoint pen.  
“What if you touch the cap to the other end of the sword?” Annabeth said. “Like where you’d put the cap if you were actually going to write with the pen.”  
“Uh…” Percy looked doubtful, but he touched the cap to the hilt of the sword. Riptide shrank back into a ballpoint pen, but now the writing point was exposed.  
“May I?” Annabeth plucked it from his hand. She flattened the napkin against the altar and began to write. Riptide’s ink glowed Celestial bronze.  
“Cool” Leo said and was scribbling something on a notepad.  
“What are you doing?” Percy asked.  
“Sending a message,” Annabeth said. “I just hope Rachel gets it.”  
“Rachel?” Percy asked. “You mean our Rachel? Oracle of Delphi Rachel?”  
“That’s the one.” Annabeth suppressed a smile.  
Whenever she brought up Rachel’s name, Percy got nervous. At one point, Rachel had been interested in dating Percy. That was ancient history. Rachel and Annabeth were good friends now. But Annabeth didn’t mind making Percy a little uneasy. You had to keep your boyfriend on his toes.  
“True” All the girls said causing their boyfriends or just friends that are boys to scooch away from them.  
Annabeth finished her note and folded the napkin. On the outside, she wrote:  
Connor,  
Give this to Rachel. Not a prank. Don’t be a moron.  
Love,  
Annabeth  
“Yep, that is totally something Annabeth would say.” Frank said.  
She took a deep breath. She was asking Rachel Dare to do something ridiculously dangerous, but it was the only way she could think of to communicate with the Romans—the only way that might avoid bloodshed.  
“Now I just need to burn it,” she said. “Anybody got a match?”  
The point of Bob’s spear shot from his broom handle. It sparked against the altar and erupted in silvery fire.  
“Uh, thanks.” Annabeth lit the napkin and set it on the altar. She watched it crumble to ash and wondered if she was crazy. Could the smoke really make it out of Tartarus?  
“We should go now,” Bob advised. “Really, really go. Before we are killed.”  
Annabeth stared at the wall of blackness in front of them. Somewhere in there was a lady who dispensed a Death Mist that might hide them from monsters—a plan recommended by a Titan, one of their bitterest enemies. Another dose of weirdness to explode her brain.  
“Right,” she said. “I’m ready.”  
“Chapter is over now” Paul said handing the book to Zeus who was holding out his hand.


	25. Annabeth XXIII

ANNABETH LITERALLY STUMBLED over the second Titan.  
Everyone tensed in anticipation.  
After entering the storm front, they plodded on for what seemed like hours, relying on the light of Percy’s Celestial bronze blade, and on Bob, who glowed faintly in the dark like some sort of crazy janitor angel.  
Annabeth could only see about five feet in front of her. In a strange way, the Dark Lands reminded her of San Francisco, where her dad lived—on those summer afternoons when the fog bank rolled in like cold, wet packing material and swallowed Pacific Heights. Except here in Tartarus, the fog was made of ink.  
Rocks loomed out of nowhere. Pits appeared at their feet, and Annabeth barely avoided falling in. Monstrous roars echoed in the gloom, but Annabeth couldn’t tell where they came from. All she could be certain of was that the terrain was still sloping down.  
Down seemed to be the only direction allowed in Tartarus. If Annabeth backtracked even a step, she felt tired and heavy, as if gravity were increasing to discourage her. Assuming that the entire pit was the body of Tartarus, Annabeth had a nasty feeling they were marching straight down his throat.  
“That is so gross” Aphrodite said while gagging.  
She was so preoccupied with that thought, she didn’t notice the ledge until it was too late.  
Percy yelled, “Whoa!” He grabbed for her arm, but she was already falling.  
“No!” Hazel yelled clutching Frank’s arm tightly in fear.  
Fortunately, it was only a shallow depression. Most of it was filled with a monster blister. She had a soft landing on a warm bouncy surface and was feeling lucky—until she opened her eyes and found herself staring through a glowing gold membrane at another, much larger face.  
She screamed and flailed, toppling sideways off the mound. Her heart did a hundred jumping jacks.  
“OMG that must have been really scary if it made Annabeth scream!” Leo said   
Percy helped her to her feet. “You okay?”  
She didn’t trust herself to answer. If she opened her mouth, she might scream again, and that would be undignified. She was a daughter of Athena, not some shrill girlie victim in a horror movie.  
“True that” Piper commented.  
But gods of Olympus… Curled in the membrane bubble in front of her was a fully formed Titan in golden armor, his skin the color of polished pennies. His eyes were closed, but he scowled so deeply he appeared to be on the verge of a bloodcurdling war cry. Even through the blister, Annabeth could feel the heat radiating from his body.  
Thalia and Nico tensed remembering that description from the titan war.  
“Hyperion,” Percy said. “I hate that guy.”  
Annabeth’s shoulder suddenly ached from an old wound. During the Battle of Manhattan, Percy had fought this Titan at the Reservoir—water against fire. It had been the first time Percy had summoned a hurricane—which wasn’t something Annabeth would ever forget. “I thought Grover turned this guy into a maple tree.”  
“Yeah,” Percy agreed. “Maybe the maple tree died, and he wound up back here?”  
“We still need to check on that,” Annabeth reminded Percy.  
Annabeth remembered how Hyperion had summoned fiery explosions, and how many satyrs and nymphs he’d destroyed before Percy and Grover stopped him.  
Percy looked down guilty that he hadn’t been fast enough to save them. Annabeth noticed and kissed him trying to get his mind off the things he shouldn’t still blame himself for.  
She was about to suggest that they burst Hyperion’s bubble before he woke up. He looked ready to pop out at any moment and start charbroiling everything in his path.  
Then she glanced at Bob. The silvery Titan was studying Hyperion with a frown of concentration—maybe recognition. Their faces looked so much alike.…  
Annabeth bit back a curse. Of course they looked alike. Hyperion was his brother. Hyperion was the Titan lord of the east. Iapetus, Bob, was the lord of the west. Take away Bob’s broom and his janitor’s clothes, put him in armor and cut his hair, change his color scheme from silver to gold, and Iapetus would have been almost indistinguishable from Hyperion.  
“Bob,” she said, “we should go.”  
“Gold, not silver,” Bob murmured. “But he looks like me.”  
“Oh no...” Jason said worriedly looking at Percy and Annabeth who were looking down at the thought of Bob.  
“Bob,” Percy said. “Hey, buddy, over here.”  
The Titan reluctantly turned.  
“Am I your friend?” Percy asked.  
“Yes.” Bob sounded dangerously uncertain. “We are friends.”  
“You know that some monsters are good,” Percy said. “And some are bad.”  
“Hmm,” Bob said. “Like…the pretty ghost ladies who serve Persephone are good. Exploding zombies are bad.”  
“That is a weird analogy but I guess it works.” Nico said.  
“Right,” Percy said. “And some mortals are good, and some are bad. Well, the same thing is true for Titans.”  
“It is?” a lot of people asked. Percy and Annabeth just nodded and glanced at Thalia and Nico sadly.  
“Titans…” Bob loomed over them, glowering. Annabeth was pretty sure her boyfriend had just made a big mistake.  
“That’s what you are,” Percy said calmly. “Bob the Titan. You’re good. You’re awesome, in fact. But some Titans are not. This guy here, Hyperion, is full-on bad. He tried to kill me…tried to kill a lot of people.”  
“Yes he did” Thalia said thinking about how sad Grover had been after that fight.  
Bob blinked his silver eyes. “But he looks…his face is so—”  
“He looks like you,” Percy agreed. “He’s a Titan, like you. But he’s not good like you are.”  
“Bob is good.” His fingers tightened on his broom handle. “Yes. There is always at least one good one—monsters, Titans, giants.”  
“Uh…” Percy grimaced. “Well, I’m not sure about the giants.”  
“Damasen was a hero!” Annabeth said her eyes shining defyingly as if daring anyone to say he wasn’t.  
“Oh, yes.” Bob nodded earnestly.  
Annabeth sensed they’d already been in this place too long. Their pursuers would be closing in.  
“We should go,” she urged. “What do we do about…?”  
“Bob,” Percy said, “it’s your call. Hyperion is your kind. We could leave him alone, but if he wakes up—”  
“It would be bad for everyone,” Leo said darkly.  
Bob’s broom-spear swept into motion. If he’d been aiming at Annabeth or Percy, they would’ve been cut in half. Instead, Bob slashed through the monstrous blister, which burst in a geyser of hot golden mud.  
Annabeth wiped the Titan sludge out of her eyes. Where Hyperion had been, there was nothing but a smoking crater.  
“Hyperion is a bad Titan,” Bob announced, his expression grim. “Now he can’t hurt my friends. He will have to re-form somewhere else in Tartarus. Hopefully it will take a long time.”  
“Not with my luck!” Percy said indignantly causing all of the demigods to worry about them seeing Hyperion again.  
The Titan’s eyes seemed brighter than usual, as if he were about to cry quicksilver.  
“Thank you, Bob,” Percy said.  
How was he keeping his cool? The way he talked to Bob left Annabeth awestruck…and maybe a little uneasy, too. If Percy had been serious about leaving the choice to Bob, then she didn’t like how much he trusted the Titan. If he’d been manipulating Bob into making that choice…well, then, Annabeth was stunned that Percy could be so calculating.  
“First of all Percy is a lot smarter than we give him credit for,” Frank started “and I think he trusted Bob to make the choice because he had no right too. Hyperion was Bob’s brother and he wasn’t hurting anyone yet. Percy told him the facts that he knew and he left the choice up to him, it was only right.”   
Percy just nodded his head at the explanation.  
He met her eyes, but she couldn’t read his expression. That bothered her too.  
“We’d better keep going,” he said.  
She and Percy followed Bob, the golden mud flecks from Hyperion’s burst bubble glowing on his janitor’s uniform.  
“That is the end of this chapter,” Zeus announced “Can we stop for another break now because I am really tired of sitting in one place?” Leo complained loudly. No one objected so we took a break.


	26. Break Time

Percy got up and stretched, Annabeth already starting down the stairs to the audience. Percy hurried to catch up with her. “Hey what's up?” Percy asked once he had caught up. “Nothing much, I was just going to go talk to your mortal friends again because they seemed nice. “Cool, I’ll join you because I don’t really want them to tell you too many embarrassing stories about me.” Annabeth laughed and they continued on their way to Percy’s mortal friends who were in a group talking together.   
“Hey guys!” Percy yelled over at them. When they noticed who had yelled at them they smiled and went over to meet us. “Percy, I had no idea your life was so complicated and dangerous!” Lucy said concern obvious in her voice “Yeah can you tell us about any more of your quests” Serena asked eagerly “Sure, I guess. Which one should I tell them Wisegirl?” “How about that quest I led” “Oh, that's perfect.”  
Percy started to tell them about the quest Annabeth led into the labyrinth when they were 14 years old. “So do you guys know what the Labyrinth is?” Percy asked the group that had all sat on the ground eagerly waiting. Jake spoke up first while the rest looked confused “It was the place where the Minotaur was originally trapped back in ancient times and where Theseus killed him.” “Yep that’s the Labyrinth, but all those stories never grasped how dangerous the Labyrinth itself is.” Percy started out and his friends now looked even more confused. “My fourth quest took place in the Labyrinth” Percy’s voice trembled as he spoke.  
“Oh my Gods! No way, how are you even alive? All of the stories about that place are scary and you said that it is worse than that!” Lucy started until Annabeth cut off her panic attack before it got to bad. “Ok, calm down Lucy. We made it out eventually and we had a lot of help along the way.” Annabeth soothed. “It all started out when I went to freshman orientation and got attacked by Kelli the empousa and Rachel saved me. After that I went to camp with Annabeth who was outside, when I got to camp everything was a mess and one of my friends who went to Kronos’ side was back in camp. He had gone insane. The only thing that we could find out from him was that another traitor named Luke was sending scouts into the Labyrinth. He had been a scout and the Labyrinth made him go crazy.”  
Annabeth then took over “I then got a prophecy from the oracle and was sent on a quest into the Labyrinth to stop Luke from using the entrance located in camp to attack us. I chose Percy, his brother Tyson, and our satyr friend Graver to come with me. The thing about the Labyrinth is that it's not just a maze, it's actually a living thing that had continued to spread and grow under the earth. It confuses you and closes off passages and literally tries to kill you every chance it gets. You can travel a few feet and be in a different state across the country and their is no proper flow of time either.”  
“We went through a lot of challenges like beating the Sphinx, finding Nico again and cleaning out the stalls of flesh eating horses that haven’t been cleaned since Hercules. We defeated the three bodied rancher. We had to split up from Grover and Tyson. Then we found Hephaestus like we were told to. We did a job for him that ended up with me exploding and causing Mt. St. Helen's to erupt. Oops. I was out of commission on Calypso's island for a while, when I left I camp back to camp and crashed my own funeral. Oops.” I finished sheepishly, thankfully Annabeth butted in again.  
“We got Rachel because she was a clear sighted mortal to help us navigate the Labyrinth and did what we had to do to complete the prophecy after a lot more challenges. We found Grover and Tyson and saw the God Pan die unfortunately and than escaped in time to fight against Kronos’ army that had already managed to get into camp. Discovered Daedalus and he collapsed the Labyrinth to stop the rest of the army from getting through. Percy then inherited his pet hellhound named Ms. O'Leary. We had a lot of deaths that day, people we were friends with and we will never forget.” Annabeth finished sadly.  
We were both almost in tears at the thought of our friends who sacrificed themselves to stop Kronos and win the war. “That's the end” I said hugging Annabeth closer to me to comfort her. My friends all stared at me most in shock and sadness others in grim silence. Jake eventually spoke up first “Wow. Just wow, that is a lot to process.” I nodded sadly in his direction because it was and you can't ever really understand a situation like that without experiencing it.   
“Hey the break is almost over now so I think we should go sit back down in our seats.” Annabeth said to me and started to drag me away. We said a quick goodbye to my mortal friends and went back to our seats just as Zeus called the break over.   
“Who would like to read the next chapter?” Zeus asked while his eyes scanned the audience for volunteers. “I do it” Apollo said brightly from his seat.


	27. Annabeth XXIV

AFTER A WHILE, Annabeth’s feet felt like Titan mush. She marched along, following Bob, listening to the monotonous slosh of liquid in his cleaning bottle.  
Stay alert, she told herself, but it was hard. Her thoughts were as numb as her legs. From time to time, Percy took her hand or made an encouraging comment; but she could tell the dark landscape was getting to him as well. His eyes had a dull sheen—like his spirit was being slowly extinguished.  
He fell into Tartarus to be with you, said a voice in her head. If he dies, it will be your fault.  
“Stop it,” she said aloud.  
“Good, you can’t think like that it isn’t good for you” Athena said surprising Percy and Annabeth because she had been quiet for so long.  
Percy frowned. “What?”  
“No, not you.” She tried for a reassuring smile, but she couldn’t quite muster one. “Talking to myself. This place…it’s messing with my mind. Giving me dark thoughts.”  
The worry lines deepened around Percy’s sea-green eyes. “Hey, Bob, where exactly are we heading?”  
“The lady,” Bob said. “Death Mist.”  
“That is so much information.” Nico said sarcastically.  
Annabeth fought down her irritation. “But what does that mean? Who is this lady?”  
“Naming her?” Bob glanced back. “Not a good idea.”  
Annabeth sighed. The Titan was right. Names had power, and speaking them here in Tartarus was probably very dangerous.  
“Can you at least tell us how far?” she asked.  
“I do not know,” Bob admitted. “I can only feel it. We wait for the darkness to get darker. Then we go sideways.”  
“How do you go sideways?” Hazel asked Percy. “I don’t know, you will have to ask Bob.”  
“Sideways,” Annabeth muttered. “Naturally.”  
“I guess it is natural now since we did it more than once” Annabeth commented absentmindedly.  
She was tempted to ask for a rest, but she didn’t want to stop. Not here in this cold, dark place. The black fog seeped into her body, turning her bones into moist Styrofoam.  
She wondered if her message would get to Rachel Dare. If Rachel could somehow carry her proposal to Reyna without getting killed in the process…  
“Of course we would get your message, but killing her would be dependent on a lot of things” Reyna said mysteriously.  
A ridiculous hope, said the voice in her head. You have only put Rachel in danger. Even if she finds the Romans, why should Reyna trust you after all that has happened?  
“Because Annabeth is smart and rational unlike Octavian” Was Reyna’s response.  
Annabeth was tempted to shout back at the voice, but she resisted. Even if she were going crazy, she didn’t want to look like she was going crazy.  
The demigods laughed.  
She desperately needed something to lift her spirits. A drink of actual water. A moment of sunlight. A warm bed. A kind word from her mother.  
Suddenly Bob stopped. He raised his hand: Wait.  
“What?” Percy whispered.  
“Shh,” Bob warned. “Ahead. Something moves.”  
All the mortals and demigods tensed waiting for the monster to pop out at their friends.  
Annabeth strained her ears. From somewhere in the fog came a deep thrumming noise, like the idling engine of a large construction vehicle. She could feel the vibrations through her shoes.  
“We will surround it,” Bob whispered. “Each of you, take a flank.”  
For the millionth time, Annabeth wished she had her dagger. She picked up a chunk of jagged black obsidian and crept to the left. Percy went right, his sword ready.  
“When did you get your drakon bone sword?” Frank asked “Soon” Annabeth said as she snuggled into Percy trying not to think of Damasen yet.  
Bob took the middle, his spearhead glowing in the fog.  
The humming got louder, shaking the gravel at Annabeth’s feet. The noise seemed to be coming from immediately in front of them.  
“Ready?” Bob murmured.  
Annabeth crouched, preparing to spring. “On three?”  
“One,” Percy whispered. “Two—”  
A figure appeared in the fog. Bob raised his spear.  
“Wait!” Annabeth shrieked.  
“What?! Why are you waiting!?” Lucy yelled scared for her friends lives.  
Bob froze just in time, the point of his spear hovering an inch above the head of a tiny calico kitten.  
“Why is a kitten in Tartarus?” Leo asked shocked.  
“Rrow?” said the kitten, clearly unimpressed by their attack plan. It butted its head against Bob’s foot and purred loudly.  
It seemed impossible, but the deep rumbling sound was coming from the kitten. As it purred, the ground vibrated and pebbles danced. The kitten fixed its yellow, lamp-like eyes on one particular rock, right between Annabeth’s feet, and pounced.  
The cat could’ve been a demon or a horrible Underworld monster in disguise. But Annabeth couldn’t help it. She picked it up and cuddled it. The little thing was bony under its fur, but otherwise it seemed perfectly normal.  
“Awe that is so cute” Piper said with a squeal.  
“How did…?” She couldn’t even form the question. “What is a kitten doing…?”  
The cat grew impatient and squirmed out of her arms. It landed with a thump, padded over to Bob, and started purring again as it rubbed against his boots.  
Percy laughed. “Somebody likes you, Bob.”  
“It must be a good monster.” Bob looked up nervously. “Isn’t it?”  
Annabeth felt a lump in her throat. Seeing the huge Titan and this tiny kitten together, she suddenly felt insignificant compared to the vastness of Tartarus. This place had no respect for anything—good or bad, small or large, wise or unwise. Tartarus swallowed Titans and demigods and kittens indiscriminately.  
Annabeth, Percy, and Nico all shuddered.  
Bob knelt down and scooped up the cat. It fit perfectly in Bob’s palm, but it decided to explore. It climbed the Titan’s arm, made itself at home on his shoulder, and closed its eyes, purring like an earthmover. Suddenly its fur shimmered. In a flash, the kitten became a ghostly skeleton, as if it had stepped behind an X-ray machine. Then it was a regular kitten again.  
“Wait so it is a monster?” Jason asked once again shocked.  
Annabeth blinked. “Did you see—?”  
“Yeah.” Percy knit his eyebrows. “Oh, man…I know that kitten. It’s one of the ones from the Smithsonian.”  
“Oh, from your third quest. I thought you were kidding about that part.” Thalia said.  
Annabeth tried to make sense of that. She’d never been to the Smithsonian with Percy.… Then she recalled several years ago, when the Titan Atlas had captured her. Percy and Thalia had led a quest to rescue her. Along the way, they’d watched Atlas raise some skeleton warriors from dragon teeth in the Smithsonian Museum.  
“Oh, the ones I destroyed when I used my powers for the first time!” Nico said sadly.  
According to Percy, the Titan’s first attempt went wrong. He’d planted saber-toothed tiger teeth by mistake, and raised a batch of skeleton kittens from the soil.  
“That’s one of them?” Annabeth asked. “How did it get here?”  
Percy spread his hands helplessly. “Atlas told his servants to take the kittens away. Maybe they destroyed the cats and they were reborn in Tartarus? I don’t know.”  
“It’s cute,” Bob said, as the kitten sniffed his ear.  
“But is it safe?” Annabeth asked.  
The Titan scratched the kitten’s chin. Annabeth didn’t know if it was a good idea, carrying around a cat grown from a prehistoric tooth; but obviously it didn’t matter now. The Titan and the cat had bonded.  
“I will call him Small Bob,” said Bob. “He is a good monster.”  
Piper squealed again “OMGs That is so adorable!”  
End of discussion. The Titan hefted his spear and they continued marching into the gloom.  
Annabeth walked in a daze, trying not to think about pizza. To keep herself distracted, she watched Small Bob the kitten pacing across Bob’s shoulders and purring, occasionally turning into a glowing kitty skeleton and then back to a calico fuzz-ball.  
“Here,” Bob announced.  
He stopped so suddenly, Annabeth almost ran into him.  
Bob stared off to their left, as if deep in thought.  
“Is this the place?” Annabeth asked. “Where we go sideways?”  
“Yes,” Bob agreed. “Darker, then sideways.”  
“How can something be darker than sideways?” Frank questioned more to himself than anyone else.  
Annabeth couldn’t tell if it was actually darker, but the air did seem colder and thicker, as if they’d stepped into a different microclimate. Again she was reminded of San Francisco, where you could walk from one neighborhood to the next and the temperature might drop ten degrees. She wondered if the Titans had built their palace on Mount Tamalpais because the Bay Area reminded them of Tartarus.  
What a depressing thought. Only Titans would see such a beautiful place as a potential outpost of the abyss—a hellish home away from home.  
The three demigods all shuddered again.  
Bob struck off to the left. They followed. The air definitely got colder. Annabeth pressed against Percy for warmth. He put his arm around her. It felt good being close to him, but she couldn’t relax.  
They’d entered some sort of forest. Towering black trees soared into the gloom, perfectly round and bare of branches, like monstrous hair follicles. The ground was smooth and pale.  
With our luck, Annabeth thought, we’re marching through the armpit of Tartarus.  
Leo couldn't help but laugh at the thought but a quick glare from Piper was enough to make him quiet again.  
Suddenly her senses were on high alert, as if somebody had snapped a rubber band against the base of her neck. She rested her hand on the trunk of the nearest tree.  
“What is it?” Percy raised his sword.  
Bob turned and looked back, confused. “We are stopping?”  
Annabeth held up her hand for silence. She wasn’t sure what had set her off. Nothing looked different. Then she realized the tree trunk was quivering. She wondered momentarily if it was the kitten’s purr; but Small Bob had fallen asleep on Large Bob’s shoulder.  
A few yards away, another tree shuddered.  
“Something’s moving above us,” Annabeth whispered. “Gather up.”  
They all tensed again in anticipation.  
Bob and Percy closed ranks with her, standing back to back.  
Annabeth strained her eyes, trying to see above them in the dark, but nothing moved.  
She had almost decided she was being paranoid when the first monster dropped to the ground only five feet away.  
Annabeth’s first thought: The Furies.  
“What no. The Furies don’t go into Tartarus!” Hades said indignantly.  
The creature looked almost exactly like one: a wrinkled hag with batlike wings, brass talons, and glowing red eyes. She wore a tattered dress of black silk, and her face was twisted and ravenous, like a demonic grandmother in the mood to kill.  
Bob grunted as another one dropped in front of him, and then another in front of Percy. Soon there were half a dozen surrounding them. More hissed in the trees above.  
They couldn’t be Furies, then. There were only three of those, and these winged hags didn’t carry whips. That didn’t comfort Annabeth. The monsters’ talons looked plenty dangerous.  
“That was honestly the least dangerous thing about them. What they can do is way more dangerous, especially to me and Annabeth” I said with a faraway look in my eyes that really scared the rest of the demigods.  
“What are you?” she demanded.  
The arai, hissed a voice. The curses!  
Annabeth tried to locate the speaker, but none of the demons had moved their mouths. Their eyes looked dead; their expressions were frozen, like a puppet’s. The voice simply floated overhead like a movie narrator’s, as if a single mind controlled all the creatures.  
“That really is creepy” Frank said softly.  
“What—what do you want?” Annabeth asked, trying to maintain a tone of confidence.  
The voice cackled maliciously. To curse you, of course! To destroy you a thousand times in the name of Mother Night!  
“Only a thousand times?” Percy murmured. “Oh, good…I thought we were in trouble.”  
“Now is really not the time for that Percy.” Jason sighed  
The circle of demon ladies closed in.  
“It's over who wants to read next?” Apollo said still with a cheery attitude.


	28. Hazel XXV

Frank hesitantly raised his had and said “I’ll read” so Apollo handed him the book and he began.  
EVERYTHING SMELLED LIKE POISON. Two days after leaving Venice, Hazel still couldn’t get the noxious scent of eau de cow monster out of her nose.  
Hazel turned a little green just remembering the smell.  
The seasickness didn’t help. The Argo II sailed down the Adriatic, a beautiful glittering expanse of blue; but Hazel couldn’t appreciate it, thanks to the constant rolling of the ship. Above deck, she tried to keep her eyes fixed on the horizon—the white cliffs that always seemed just a mile or so to the east. What country was that, Croatia? She wasn’t sure. She just wished she were on solid ground again.  
The thing that nauseated her most was the weasel.  
“Weasel?” A mortal asked from the audience. The seven all burst out laughing at the memory of Gale the farting weasel while everyone else was just confused about why it was so funny.  
Last night, Hecate’s pet Gale had appeared in her cabin. Hazel woke from a nightmare, thinking, What is that smell? She found a furry rodent propped on her chest, staring at her with its beady black eyes.  
Nothing like waking up screaming, kicking off your covers, and dancing around your cabin while a weasel scampers between your feet, screeching and farting.  
Now everyone was laughing while Hazel was blushing bright red from embarrassment.  
Her friends rushed to her room to see if she was okay. The weasel was difficult to explain. Hazel could tell that Leo was trying hard not to make a joke.  
In the morning, once the excitement died down, Hazel decided to visit Coach Hedge, since he could talk to animals.  
She’d found his cabin door ajar and heard the coach inside, talking as if he were on the phone with someone—except they had no phones on board. Maybe he was sending a magical Iris-message? Hazel had heard that the Greeks used those a lot.  
“Sure, hon,” Hedge was saying. “Yeah, I know, baby. No, it’s great news, but—” His voice broke with emotion. Hazel suddenly felt horrible for eavesdropping.  
“Wait you said you didn’t hear anything!” Coach Hedge yelled waving his baseball bat and blushing. Hazel apologized and said that it was a mistake and finally Coach Hedge let go of his baseball bat and sat back down muttering about nosey cupcakes.  
She would’ve backed away, but Gale squeaked at her heels. Hazel knocked on the coach’s door.  
Hedge poked his head out, scowling as usual, but his eyes were red.  
“What?” he growled.  
“Um…sorry,” Hazel said. “Are you okay?”

The coach snorted and opened his door wide. “Kinda question is that?”

There was no one else in the room.

“I—” Hazel tried to remember why she was there. “I wondered if you could talk to my weasel.”

“That had to be one of the most awkward things I have ever had to ask.” Hazel said.

The coach’s eyes narrowed. He lowered his voice. “Are we speaking in code? Is there an intruder aboard?”

“Well, sort of.”

Gale peeked out from behind Hazel’s feet and started chattering.

The coach looked offended. He chattered back at the weasel. They had what sounded like a very intense argument.

“It was intense and that polecat was really rude and they never give a straight answer!” Coach said as if that was common knowledge.

“What did she say?” Hazel asked.

“A lot of rude things,” grumbled the satyr. “The gist of it: she’s here to see how it goes.”

“How what goes?”

Coach Hedge stomped his hoof. “How am I supposed to know? She’s a polecat! They never give a straight answer. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got, uh, stuff…”

“Told you” Coach huffed.

He closed the door in her face.

“Wow that was rude Coach, what would Millie say?” Piper reprimanded Coach who suddenly looked away with a remorseful expression. “Sorry Cupcake” He apologized to Hazel who just waved it off and said it was fine.

After breakfast, Hazel stood at the port rail, trying to settle her stomach. Next to her, Gale ran up and down the railing, passing gas; but the strong wind off the Adriatic helped whisk it away.

Hazel wondered what was wrong with Coach Hedge. He must have been using an Iris-message to talk with someone, but if he’d gotten great news, why had he looked so devastated? She’d never seen him so shaken up. Unfortunately, she doubted the coach would ask for help if he needed it. He wasn’t exactly the warm and open type.

She stared at the white cliffs in the distance and thought about why Hecate had sent Gale the polecat.

She’s here to see how it goes.

Something was about to happen. Hazel would be tested.

She didn’t understand how she was supposed to learn magic with no training. Hecate expected her to defeat some super-powerful sorceress—the lady in the gold dress, whom Leo had described from his dream. But how?

“Yes you gods never tell us how we are supposed to do things and just expect us to just know already. It is really annoying.” Nico said grouchily from his seat next to me and Annabeth. 

Hazel had spent all her free time trying to figure that out. She’d stared at her spatha, trying to make it look like a walking stick. She’d tried to summon a cloud to hide the full moon. She’d concentrated until her eyes crossed and her ears popped, but nothing happened. She couldn’t manipulate the Mist.

The last few nights, her dreams had gotten worse. She found herself back in the Fields of Asphodel, drifting aimlessly among the ghosts. Then she was in Gaea’s cave in Alaska, where Hazel and her mother had died as the ceiling collapsed and the voice of the Earth Goddess wailed in anger. She was on the stairs of her mother’s apartment building in New Orleans, face-to-face with her father, Pluto. His cold fingers gripped her arm. The fabric of his black wool suit writhed with imprisoned souls. He fixed her with his dark angry eyes and said: The dead see what they believe they will see. So do the living. That is the secret.

“Oh my Gods he gave me a useful hint! I seriously didn’t realize that until now. Sorry Dad.” Hazel said as an apologetic look was directed at her father who briefly shifted into Pluto who nodded in her direction with a soft smile before shifting back into a scowling Hades who immediately looked away.

He’d never said that to her in real life. She had no idea what it meant.

The worst nightmares seemed like glimpses of the future. Hazel was stumbling through a dark tunnel while a woman’s laughter echoed around her.

Control this if you can, child of Pluto, the woman taunted.

And always, Hazel dreamed about the images she’d seen at Hecate’s crossroads: Leo falling through the sky; Percy and Annabeth lying unconscious, possibly dead, in front of black metal doors; and a shrouded figure looming above them—the giant Clytius wrapped in darkness.

Next to her on the rail, Gale the weasel chittered impatiently. Hazel was tempted to push the stupid rodent into the sea.

“Wish you did, It was really annoying” Jason said darkly.

I can’t even control my own dreams, she wanted to scream. How am I supposed to control the Mist?

She was so miserable, she didn’t notice Frank until he was standing at her side.

“Feeling any better?” he asked.

He took her hand, his fingers completely covering hers. She couldn’t believe how much taller he’d gotten. He had changed into so many animals, she wasn’t sure why one more transformation should amaze her…but suddenly he’d grown into his weight. No one could call him pudgy or cuddly anymore. He looked like a football player, solid and strong, with a new center of gravity. His shoulders had broadened. He walked with more confidence.

What Frank had done on that bridge in Venice…Hazel was still in awe. None of them had actually seen the battle, but no one doubted it. Frank’s whole bearing had changed. Even Leo had stopped making jokes at his expense.

“I’m—I’m all right,” Hazel managed. “You?”

He smiled, the corners of his eyes crinkling. “I’m, uh, taller. Otherwise, yeah. I’m good. I haven’t really, you know, changed inside.…”

His voice held a little of the old doubt and awkwardness—the voice of her Frank, who always worried about being a klutz and messing up.

“Awe that is so cute Hazel!” Piper squealed to a blushing Hazel and Frank. Frank quickly started to read again.

Hazel felt relieved. She liked that part of him. At first, his new appearance had shocked her. She’d been worried that his personality had changed as well.

Now she was starting to relax about that. Despite all his strength, Frank was the same sweet guy. He was still vulnerable. He still trusted her with his biggest weakness—the piece of magical firewood she carried in her coat pocket, next to her heart.

Piper was trying to hide her squealing.

“I know, and I’m glad.” She squeezed his hand. “It’s…it’s actually not you I’m worried about.”

Frank grunted. “How’s Nico doing?”

She’d been thinking about herself, not Nico, but she followed Frank’s gaze to the top of the foremast, where Nico was perched on the yardarm.

Nico claimed that he liked to keep watch because he had good eyes. Hazel knew that wasn’t the reason. The top of the mast was one of the few places on board where Nico could be alone. The others had offered him the use of Percy’s cabin, since Percy was…well, absent. Nico adamantly refused. He spent most of his time up in the rigging, where he didn’t have to talk with the rest of the crew.

“Nico we have talked about that!” Percy said seriously to Nico who was looking away and staring at a wall like it was suddenly the most interesting thing in the world. “Sorry” Nico murmured but Percy heard it anyway and startled Nico by dragging him into a hug from behind. “Hey let me go!” Nico yelled at Percy but Percy’s only response was “Never and started to give him a nuggy. Nico would never have admitted it but he was secretly enjoying himself and Percy knew it. Frank just started reading again like this was totally normal.

Since he’d been turned into a corn plant in Venice, he’d only gotten more reclusive and morose.

“I don’t know,” Hazel admitted. “He’s been through a lot. Getting captured in Tartarus, being held prisoner in that bronze jar, watching Percy and Annabeth fall…”  
“And promising to lead us to Epirus.” Frank nodded. “I get the feeling Nico doesn’t play well with others.”  
“No duh, what gave it away” Nico said as he finally escaped from Percy.

Frank stood up straight. He was wearing a beige T-shirt with a picture of a horse and the words PALIO DI SIENA. He’d only bought it a couple of days ago, but now it was too small. When he stretched, his midriff was exposed.  
Hazel realized she was staring. She quickly looked away, her face flushed.  
Hazel and Frank both blushed again and Piper couldn’t help but squeal again.  
“Nico is my only relative,” she said. “He’s not easy to like, but…thanks for being kind to him.”  
“Wow, thanks Hazel” this time Nico sounded Genuinely thankful. Hazel just smiled at him.  
Frank smiled. “Hey, you put up with my grandmother in Vancouver. Talk about not easy to like.”  
“She was amazing!” Percy and Hazel said at the same time.  
“I loved your grandmother!”  
Gale the polecat scampered up to them, farted, and ran away.  
“Ugh.” Frank waved away the smell. “Why is that thing here, anyway?”  
Hazel was almost glad she wasn’t on dry land. As agitated as she felt, gold and gems would probably be popping up all around her feet.  
“Hecate sent Gale to observe,” she said.  
“Observe what?”  
Hazel tried to take comfort in Frank’s presence, his new aura of solidity and strength.  
“I don’t know,” she said at last. “Some kind of test.”  
Suddenly the boat lurched forward.  
“Seriously! Hecate had to have known this would happen since she sent Gale the stupid farting Weasel. She seriously should have sent a warning.” Leo ranted remembering how this had all played out and he was useless to help his friends.


	29. Hazel XXVI

I’ll read next a mortal teacher said so he was handed the book.  
HAZEL AND FRANK TUMBLED OVER EACH OTHER. Hazel accidentally gave herself the Heimlich maneuver with the pommel of her sword and curled on the deck, moaning and coughing up the taste of katobleps poison.  
Through a fog of pain, she heard the ship’s figurehead, Festus the bronze dragon, creaking in alarm and shooting fire.  
Dimly, Hazel wondered if they’d hit an iceberg—but in the Adriatic, in the middle of summer?  
The ship rocked to port with a massive commotion, like telephone poles snapping in half.  
“Gahh!” Leo yelled somewhere behind her. “It’s eating the oars!”  
“What monster found you guys this time?” I asked curiously since I hadn’t heard about this story yet. “Um... Kind of hard to explain, but let’s just say we met one of your siblings.” Jason said weakly remembering the smell of Scirons feet. “Another one! Wow I sure do have a lot of evil siblings.” Percy said darkly.  
What is? Hazel wondered. She tried to stand, but something large and heavy was pinning her legs. She realized it was Frank, grumbling as he tried to extract himself from a pile of loose rope.  
Everyone else was scrambling. Jason jumped over them, his sword drawn, and raced toward the stern. Piper was already on the quarterdeck, shooting food from her cornucopia and yelling, “Hey! HEY! Eat this, ya stupid turtle!”  
Turtle?  
“My brothers a turtle?” I asked nonchalantly since i had already met other weird siblings of mine. “No it was the person controlling the turtle” Hazel explained.  
Frank helped Hazel to her feet. “You okay?”  
“Yeah,” Hazel lied, clutching her stomach. “Go!”  
Frank sprinted up the steps, slinging off his backpack, which instantly transformed into a bow and quiver. By the time he reached the helm, he had already fired one arrow and was nocking the second.  
Leo frantically worked the ship’s controls. “Oars won’t retract. Get it away! Get it away!”  
Up in the rigging, Nico’s face was slack with shock.  
“Styx—it’s huge!” he yelled. “Port! Go port!”  
Coach Hedge was the last one on deck. He compensated for that with enthusiasm. He bounded up the steps, waving his baseball bat, and without hesitation goat-galloped to the stern and leaped over the rail with a gleeful “Ha-HA!”  
“Coach, sometimes you really make me question your sanity” Annabeth said to coach who just laughed.  
Hazel staggered toward the quarterdeck to join her friends. The boat shuddered. More oars snapped, and Leo yelled, “No, no, no! Dang slimy-shelled son of a mother!”  
Hazel reached the stern and couldn’t believe what she saw.  
When she heard the word turtle, she thought of a cute little thing the size of a jewelry box, sitting on a rock in the middle of a fishpond. When she heard huge, her mind tried to adjust—okay, perhaps it was like the Galapagos tortoise she’d seen in the zoo once, with a shell big enough to ride on.  
“Hazel this is a monster. You should always assume it is big and dangerous, not cute and small” Leo reprimanded Hazel teasingly. Hazel just looked away in embarrassment.  
She did not envision a creature the size of an island. When she saw the massive dome of craggy black and brown squares, the word turtle simply did not compute. Its shell was more like a landmass—hills of bone, shiny pearl valleys, kelp and moss forests, rivers of seawater trickling down the grooves of its carapace.  
On the ship’s starboard side, another part of the monster rose from the water like a submarine.  
Lares of Rome…was that its head?  
“I really want to meet this turtle now! I need to add it to my collection of giant sea monsters I have fought. You remember the giant crab on the Princess Andromeda right Annabeth?” Percy gushed not even realizing that he had inadvertenly mentioned Luke. Annabeth flinched and than Percy realized what he had done and a dark look fell across his face as Annabeth answered a weak “yes”. “Sorry Annabeth, I didn’t mean to bring that back up. I just wasn’t thinking.” Percy apologized quietly. Everyone else including all the demigods that hadn’t been present during the second Titan war were really confused. Piper was the first to break the tense silence, “Is everything ok” she asked nervously Annabeth broke out of her memories and answered that they were fine and should keep reading. They quickly started to read again.  
Its gold eyes were the size of wading pools, with dark sideways slits for pupils. Its skin glistened like wet army camouflage—brown flecked with green and yellow. Its red, toothless mouth could’ve swallowed the Athena Parthenos in one bite.  
Hazel watched as it snapped off half a dozen oars.  
“Stop that!” Leo wailed.  
“Like it's really going to listen to you Leo” Frank said jokingly trying to lift the still tense atmosphere.  
Coach Hedge clambered around the turtle’s shell, whacking at it uselessly with his baseball bat and yelling, “Take that! And that!”  
Jason flew from the stern and landed on the creature’s head. He stabbed his golden sword straight between its eyes, but the blade slipped sideways, as if the turtle’s skin were greased steel. Frank shot arrows at the monster’s eyes with no success. The turtle’s filmy inner eyelids blinked with uncanny precision, deflecting each shot. Piper shot cantaloupes into the water, yelling, “Fetch, ya stupid turtle!” But the turtle seemed fixated on eating the Argo II.  
“How did it get so close?” Hazel demanded.  
Leo threw his hands up in exasperation. “Must be that shell. Guess it’s invisible to sonar. It’s a freaking stealth turtle!”  
“Can the ship fly?” Piper asked.  
“With half our oars broken off?” Leo punched some buttons and spun his Archimedes sphere. “I’ll have to try something else.”  
“There!” Nico yelled from above. “Can you get us to those straits?”  
Hazel looked where he was pointing. About half a mile to the east, a long strip of land ran parallel to the coastal cliffs. It was hard to be sure from a distance, but the stretch of water between them looked to be only twenty or thirty yards across—possibly wide enough for the Argo II to slip through, but definitely not wide enough for the giant turtle’s shell.  
“Yeah. Yeah.” Leo apparently understood. He turned the Archimedes sphere. “Jason, get away from that thing’s head! I have an idea!”

“Oh no, Leo has an idea” Reyna said remembering Leo firing on New Rome after they had first met. Leo seemed to realize what she was thinking about and through his hands up in exasperation “I was being controlled by an eidolon and you know it!” he cried before pouting.   
Jason was still hacking away at the turtle’s face, but when he heard Leo say I have an idea, he made the only smart choice. He flew away as fast as possible.

“See” Reyna said smugly to a still pouting Leo who looked at Hazel in betrayal.

“Coach, come on!” Jason said.

“No, I got this!” Hedge said, but Jason grabbed him around the waist and took off. Unfortunately, the coach struggled so much that Jason’s sword fell out of his hand and splashed into the sea.

“Coach!” Jason complained.

“What?” Hedge said. “I was softening him up!”

The turtle head-butted the hull, almost tossing the whole crew off the port side. Hazel heard a cracking sound, like the keel had splintered.

“Just another minute,” Leo said, his hands flying over the console.

“We might not be here in another minute!” Frank fired his last arrow.

Piper yelled at the turtle, “Go away!”

For a moment, it actually worked. The turtle turned from the ship and dipped its head underwater. But then it came right back and rammed them even harder.

Jason and Coach Hedge landed on the deck.

“You all right?” Piper asked.

“Fine,” Jason muttered. “Without a weapon, but fine.”

“Fire in the shell!” Leo cried, spinning his Wii controller.

Hazel thought the stern had exploded. Jets of fire blasted out behind them, washing over the turtle’s head. The ship shot forward and threw Hazel to the deck again.

She hauled herself up and saw that the ship was bouncing over the waves at incredible speed, trailing fire like a rocket. The turtle was already a hundred yards behind them, its head charred and smoking.

The monster bellowed in frustration and started after them, its paddle feet scooping through the water with such power that it actually started to gain on them. The entrance to the straits was still a quarter mile ahead.

“A distraction,” Leo muttered. “We’ll never make it unless we get a distraction.”

“A distraction,” Hazel repeated.

She concentrated and thought: Arion!

She had no idea whether it would work. But instantly, Hazel spotted something on the horizon—a flash of light and steam. It streaked across the surface of the Adriatic. In a heartbeat, Arion stood on the quarterdeck.

Gods of Olympus, Hazel thought. I love this horse.

“Looks like Frank has some competition from my brother” Percy said and than the mortals realized what Percy had been talking about earlier having met a lot of his siblings. Frank just glared at Percy playfully.

Arion snorted as if to say, Of course you do. You’re not stupid.

“That is probably exactly what he said just with more cuss words.” Poseidon said as he sighed at his sons awful language. Percy agreed.

Hazel climbed on his back. “Piper, I could use that charmspeak of yours.”

“Once upon a time, I liked turtles,” Piper muttered, accepting a hand up. “Not anymore!”

Hazel spurred Arion. He leaped over the side of the boat, hitting the water at a full gallop.

The turtle was a fast swimmer, but it couldn’t match Arion’s speed. Hazel and Piper zipped around the monster’s head, Hazel slicing with her sword, Piper shouting random commands like, “Dive! Turn left! Look behind you!”

The sword did no damage. Each command only worked for a moment, but they were making the turtle very annoyed. Arion whinnied derisively as the turtle snapped at him, only to get a mouthful of horse vapor.

Soon the monster had completely forgotten the Argo II. Hazel kept stabbing at its head. Piper kept yelling commands and using her cornucopia to bounce coconuts and roasted chickens off the turtle’s eyeballs.

As soon as the Argo II had passed into the straits, Arion broke off his harassment. They sped after the ship, and a moment later were back on deck.

The rocket fire had extinguished, though smoking bronze exhaust vents still jutted from the stern. The Argo II limped forward under sail power, but their plan had paid off. They were safely harbored in the narrow waters, with a long, rocky island to starboard and the sheer white cliffs of the mainland to port. The turtle stopped at the entrance to the straits and glared at them balefully, but it made no attempt to follow. Its shell was obviously much too wide.

Hazel dismounted and got a big hug from Frank. “Nice work out there!” he said.

Her face flushed. “Thanks.”

Piper slid down next to her. “Leo, since when do we have jet propulsion?”

“Aw, you know…” Leo tried to look modest and failed. “Just a little something I whipped up in my spare time. Wish I could give you more than a few seconds of burn, but at least it got us out of there.”

“And roasted the turtle’s head,” Jason said appreciatively. “So what now?”

“Kill it!” Coach said. “You even have to ask? We got enough distance. We got ballistae. Lock and load, demigods!”

Jason frowned. “Coach, first of all, you made me lose my sword.”

“A demigod needs a weapon to survive even with their powers!” Nico said sternly to the coach and the coach bowed his head in shame.

“Hey! I didn’t ask for an evac!”

“Coach it was life or death, and we would rather have you live than die!” Reyna scolded Coach.

“Second, I don’t think the ballistae will do any good. That shell is like Nemean Lion skin. Its head isn’t any softer.”

“So we chuck one right down its throat,” Coach said, “like you guys did with that shrimp monster thing in the Atlantic. Light it up from the inside.”

Frank scratched his head. “Might work. But then you’ve got a five-million-kilo turtle carcass blocking the entrance to the straits. If we can’t fly with the oars broken, how do we get the ship out?”  
“You wait and fix the oars!” Coach said. “Or just sail the other direction, you big galoot.”  
Frank looked confused. “What’s a galoot?”  
“Guys!” Nico called down from the mast. “About sailing the other direction? I don’t think that’s going to work.”  
He pointed past the prow.  
A quarter mile ahead of them, the long rocky strip of land curved in and met the cliffs. The channel ended in a narrow V.  
“We’re not in a strait,” Jason said. “We’re in a dead end.”  
Hazel got a cold feeling in her fingers and toes. On the port rail, Gale the weasel sat up on her haunches, staring at Hazel expectantly.  
“This is a trap,” Hazel said.  
The others looked at her.  
“Nah, it’s fine,” Leo said. “Worse that happens, we make repairs. Might take overnight, but I can get the ship flying again.”  
At the mouth of the inlet, the turtle roared. It didn’t appear interested in leaving.  
“Well…” Piper shrugged. “At least the turtle can’t get us. We’re safe here.”  
“Piper you just jinxed it!” all the demigods that were not present at this point in the journey yelled and Piper just looked away since she knew it was true.   
That was something no demigod should ever say. The words had barely left Piper’s mouth when an arrow sank into the mainmast, six inches from her face.  
“That was really close and gave me a heart attack” Jason said and pulled Piper closer to him as if to make sure she was still there.  
The crew scattered for cover, except for Piper, who stood frozen in place, gaping at the arrow that had almost pierced her nose the hard way.  
“Piper, duck!” Jason whispered harshly.  
But no other missiles rained down.  
Frank studied the angle of the bolt in the mast and pointed toward the top of the cliffs.  
“Up there,” he said. “Single shooter. See him?”  
The sun was in her eyes, but Hazel spotted a tiny figure standing at the top of the ledge. His bronze armor glinted.  
“Who the heck is he?” Leo demanded. “Why is he firing at us?”  
“Guys?” Piper’s voice was thin and watery. “There’s a note.”  
“There is usually a note in a situation like this. It should be expected.” Thalia said.  
Hazel hadn’t seen it before, but a parchment scroll was tied to the arrow shaft. She wasn’t sure why, but that made her angry. She stormed over and untied it.  
“Uh, Hazel?” Leo said. “You sure that’s safe?”  
She read the note out loud. “First line: Stand and deliver.”  
“I think your going to get robbed” A mortal suggested helpfully.  
“What does that mean?” Coach Hedge complained. “We are standing. Well, crouching, anyway. And if that guy is expecting a pizza delivery, forget it!”  
“There’s more,” Hazel said. “This is a robbery. Send two of your party to the top of the cliff with all your valuables. No more than two. Leave the magic horse. No flying. No tricks. Just climb.”  
“Yep and he knew exactly who we were, it wasn’t hard to figure out who he worked for.” Jason said mournfully as he remembered how useless he had been facing Sciron.  
“Climb what?” Piper asked.  
Nico pointed. “There.”  
A narrow set of steps was carved into the cliff, leading to the top. The turtle, the dead-end channel, the cliff…Hazel got the feeling this was not the first time the letter writer had ambushed a ship here.  
She cleared her throat and kept reading aloud: “I do mean all your valuables. Otherwise my turtle and I will destroy you. You have five minutes.”  
“Use the catapults!” cried the coach.  
“P.S.,” Hazel read, “Don’t even think about using your catapults.”  
“He is very thorough and obviously can see what you have available to use against him. He even included your powers.” Athena said trying to figure out who they were dealing with. “Unfortunately I think I figured out which of my children you will be facing on that cliff. I is really obvious once you’ve heard about him.” Poseidon said with a sad expression on his face. Even if his children used their powers to do bad things, they were still his children and he hated when they fought against one another or a friend of one of his children.   
“Curse it!” said the coach. “This guy is good.”  
“Is the note signed?” Nico asked.  
Hazel shook her head. She’d heard a story back at Camp Jupiter, something about a robber who worked with a giant turtle; but as usual, as soon as she needed the information, it sat annoyingly in the back of her memory, just out of reach.  
“I told you, once you’ve heard about him it's obvious when you see him.” Poseidon said cryptically.  
The weasel Gale watched her, waiting to see what she would do.  
The test hasn’t happened yet, Hazel thought.  
Distracting the turtle hadn’t been enough. Hazel hadn’t proven anything about how she could manipulate the Mist…mostly because she couldn’t manipulate the Mist.  
“I could I just didn’t know I was doing it yet. It wasn’t very effective because of that. Sorry it took me so long to figure out guys.” hazel said apologizing for all the close calls she had caused. They all just waved her off saying she was just learning and that it was fine.  
Leo studied the cliff top and muttered under his breath. “That’s not a good trajectory. Even if I could arm the catapult before that guy pincushioned us with arrows, I don’t think I could make the shot. That’s hundreds of feet, almost straight up.”  
“Yeah,” Frank grumbled. “My bow is useless too. He’s got a huge advantage, being above us like that. I couldn’t reach him.”  
“And, um…” Piper nudged the arrow that was stuck in the mast. “I have a feeling he’s a good shot. I don’t think he meant to hit me. But if he did…”  
She didn’t need to elaborate. Whoever that robber was, he could hit a target from hundreds of feet away. He could shoot them all before they could react.

“I’ll go,” Hazel said.

She hated the idea, but she was sure Hecate had set this up as some sort of twisted challenge. This was Hazel’s test—her turn to save the ship. As if she needed confirmation, Gale scampered along the railing and jumped on her shoulder, ready to hitch a ride.

The others stared at her.

Frank gripped his bow. “Hazel—”

“No, listen,” she said, “this robber wants valuables. I can go up there, summon gold, jewels, whatever he wants.”

Leo raised an eyebrow. “If we pay him off, you think he’ll actually let us go?”

“We don’t have much choice,” Nico said. “Between that guy and the turtle…”

Jason raised his hand. The others fell silent.

“I’ll go too,” he said. “The letter says two people. I’ll take Hazel up there and watch her back. Besides, I don’t like the look of those steps. If Hazel falls…well, I can use the winds to keep us both from coming down the hard way.”

Arion whinnied in protest, as if to say, You’re going without me? You’re kidding, right?

“I have to, Arion,” Hazel said. “Jason…yes. I think you’re right. It’s the best plan.”

“Only wish I had my sword.” Jason glared at the coach. “It’s back there at the bottom of the sea, and we don’t have Percy to retrieve it.”

The name Percy passed over them like a cloud. The mood on deck got even darker.

“Wow you guys need to lighten up. You are facing a bandit who is apparently one of my evil siblings, you can’t get distracted” Percy lectured the rest of the seven except Annabeth. 

Hazel stretched out her arm. She didn’t think about it. She just concentrated on the water and called for Imperial gold.

A stupid idea. The sword was much too far away, probably hundreds of feet underwater. But she felt a quick tug in her fingers, like a bite on a fishing line, and Jason’s blade flew out of the water and into her hand.

“Here,” she said, handing it over.

Jason’s eyes widened. “How… That was like half a mile!”

“I’ve been practicing,” she said, though it wasn’t true.

She hoped she hadn’t accidentally cursed Jason’s sword by summoning it, the way she cursed jewels and precious metals.  
“Wait you gave it to me and you weren’t sure if it was cursed or not!” Jason squeaked and Hazel laughed at his terrified expression.

Somehow, though, she thought, weapons were different. After all, she’d raised a bunch of Imperial gold equipment from Glacier Bay and distributed it to the Fifth Cohort. That had worked out okay.

She decided not to worry about it. She felt so angry at Hecate and so tired of being manipulated by the gods that she wasn’t going to let any trifling problems stand in her way. “Now, if there are no other objections, we have a robber to meet.”

“It's over now, who would like to read next?” the mortal teacher asked. Paul raised his hand “I will.”


	30. Hazel XXVII

HAZEL LIKED THE GREAT OUTDOORS—but climbing a two-hundred-foot cliff on a stairway without rails, with a bad-tempered weasel on her shoulder? Not so much. Especially when she could have ridden Arion to the top in a matter of seconds.

“I totally understand” Jason said remembering his time posing as an old man in Ithaca.

Jason walked behind her so he could catch her if she fell. Hazel appreciated that, but it didn’t make the sheer drop any less scary.

“Oh my God, imagine it if Thalia was the one who was going up there. She would hate having to rely on her brother like that.” Annabeth remarked with a mischievous smirk on her face amed at Thalia. Thalia in retaliation, using static electricity, shocked Annabeth. 

She glanced to her right, which was a mistake. Her foot almost slipped, sending a spray of gravel over the edge. Gale squeaked in alarm.

“You all right?” Jason asked.

“Yes.” Hazel’s heart jackhammered at her ribs. “Fine.”

She had no room to turn and look at him. She just had to trust he wouldn’t let her plummet to her death. Since he could fly, he was the only logical backup. Still, she wished it was Frank at her back, or Nico, or Piper, or Leo. Or even…well, okay, maybe not Coach Hedge. But still, Hazel couldn’t get a read on Jason Grace.

“Really? I thought I was pretty straightforward person.” Jason said a little confused.

Ever since she’d arrived at Camp Jupiter, she’d heard stories about him. The campers spoke with reverence about the son of Jupiter who’d risen from the lowly ranks of the Fifth Cohort to become praetor, led them to victory in the Battle of Mount Tam, then disappeared. Even now, after all the events of the past couple of weeks, Jason seemed more like a legend than a person. She had a hard time warming up to him, with those icy blue eyes and that careful reserve, like he was calculating every word before he said it. Also, she couldn’t forget how he had been ready to write off her brother, Nico, when they’d learned he was a captive in Rome.

“Ok, I guess that makes sense. People love to tell stories about me and it must have been so much worse while I was gone and you hadn’t actually met me. Plus I was pretty mean of me to do that to Nico.” Jason said more to himself than everyone else.

Jason had thought Nico was bait for a trap. He had been right. And maybe, now that Nico was safe, Hazel could see why Jason’s caution was a good idea. Still, she didn’t quite know what to think of the guy. What if they got themselves in trouble at the top of this cliff, and Jason decided that saving Hazel wasn’t in the best interest of the quest?

“I would never think that! I was thinking Nico was bait because it was obvious! That doesn't mean I wouldn’t try to save him” Jason pouted to Hazel who just smiled at him before saying “Yeah, I know that now.”

She glanced up. She couldn’t see the thief from here, but she sensed he was waiting. Hazel was confident she could produce enough gems and gold to impress even the greediest robber. She wondered if the treasures she summoned would still bring bad luck. She’d never been sure whether that curse had been broken when she had died the first time. This seemed like a good opportunity to find out. Anybody who robbed innocent demigods with a giant turtle deserved a few nasty curses.

“I totally agree!” Percy said “It is such a bad way to use your powers.”

Gale the weasel jumped off her shoulder and scampered ahead. She glanced back and barked eagerly.

“Going as fast as I can,” Hazel muttered.

She couldn’t shake the feeling that the weasel was anxious to watch her fail.

“This, uh, controlling the Mist,” Jason said. “Have you had any luck?”

“No,” Hazel admitted.

She didn’t like to think about her failures—the seagull she couldn’t turn into a dragon, Coach Hedge’s baseball bat stubbornly refusing to turn into a hot dog. She just couldn’t make herself believe any of it was possible.

“You’ll get it,” Jason said.

His tone surprised her. It wasn’t a throwaway comment just to be nice. He sounded truly convinced. She kept climbing, but she imagined him watching her with those piercing blue eyes, his jaw set with confidence.

“How can you be sure?” she asked.

“Just am. I’ve got a good instinct for what people can do—demigods, anyway. Hecate wouldn’t have picked you if she didn’t believe you had power.”

Maybe that should have made Hazel feel better. It didn’t.

“It's understandable to feel that way about it. We have all struggled with our powers at some point.” Leo said with a serious expression.

She had a good instinct for people too. She understood what motivated most of her friends—even her brother, Nico, who wasn’t easy to read.

“Hey, I am not that hard to read!” Nico said indignantly.

But Jason? She didn’t have a clue. Everybody said he was a natural leader. She believed it. Here he was, making her feel like a valued member of the team, telling her she was capable of anything. But what was Jason capable of?

She couldn’t talk to anyone about her doubts. Frank was in awe of the guy. Piper, of course, was head-over-heels. Leo was his best friend. Even Nico seemed to follow his lead without question.

But Hazel couldn’t forget that Jason had been Hera’s first move in the war against the giants. The Queen of Olympus had dropped Jason into Camp Half-Blood, which had started this entire chain of events to stop Gaea. Why Jason first? Something told Hazel he was the linchpin. Jason would be the final play, too.  
“Part of it” Jason agreed.  
To storm or fire the world must fall. That’s what the prophecy said. As much as Hazel feared fire, she feared storms more. Jason Grace could cause some pretty huge storms.  
She glanced up and saw the rim of the cliff only a few yards above her.  
She reached the top, breathless and sweaty. A long sloping valley marched inland, dotted with scraggly olive trees and limestone boulders. There were no signs of civilization.  
Hazel’s legs trembled from the climb. Gale seemed anxious to explore. The weasel barked and farted and scampered into the nearest bushes. Far below, the Argo II looked like a toy boat in the channel. Hazel didn’t understand how anyone could shoot an arrow accurately from this high up, accounting for the wind and the glare of the sun off the water. At the mouth of the inlet, the massive shape of the turtle’s shell glinted like a burnished coin.  
Jason joined her at the top, looking no worse for the climb.  
He started to say, “Where—”  
“Here!” said a voice.  
Hazel flinched. Only ten feet away, a man had appeared, a bow and quiver over his shoulder and two old-fashioned flintlock dueling pistols in his hands. He wore high leather boots, leather breeches, and a pirate-style shirt. His curly black hair looked like a little kid’s do and his sparkly green eyes were friendly enough, but a red bandana covered the lower half of his face.  
“Welcome!” the bandit cried, pointing his guns at them. “Your money or your life!”  
“How cliche can you be?” Thalia said smirking.   
Hazel was certain that he hadn’t been there a second ago. He’d simply materialized, as if he’d stepped out from behind an invisible curtain.  
“Who are you?” Hazel asked.  
The bandit laughed. “Sciron, of course!”  
“He seriously just told you his name?! On his note he put the ‘anonymous bandit’ but now he just gives you his name!” Reyna said exasperatedly at the lack of professionalism.  
“Chiron?” Jason asked. “Like the centaur?”  
The bandit rolled his eyes. “Sky-ron, my friend. Son of Poseidon! Thief extraordinaire! All-around awesome guy! But that’s not important. I’m not seeing any valuables!” he cried, as if this were excellent news. “I guess that means you want to die?”  
“He even gave away what powers he might have because he said who his parent is! How stupid is this guy?!” Nico said also exasperated at this bandit.  
“Wait,” Hazel said. “We’ve got valuables. But if we give them up, how can we be sure you’ll let us go?”  
“Oh, they always ask that,” Sciron said. “I promise you, on the River Styx, that as soon as you surrender what I want, I will not shoot you. I will send you right back down that cliff.”  
Hazel gave Jason a wary look. River Styx or no, the way Sciron phrased his promise didn’t reassure her.  
“What if we fought you?” Jason asked. “You can’t attack us and hold our ship hostage at the same—”  
BANG! BANG!  
“Or he can” Annabeth said concerned for her friends  
It happened so fast, Hazel’s brain needed a moment to catch up.  
Smoke curled from the side of Jason’s head. Just above his left ear, a groove cut through his hair like a racing stripe. One of Sciron’s flintlocks was still pointed at his face. The other flintlock was pointed down, over the side of the cliff, as if Sciron’s second shot had been fired at the Argo II.  
Hazel choked from delayed shock. “What did you do?”  
“Oh, don’t worry!” Sciron laughed. “If you could see that far—which you can’t—you’d see a hole in the deck between the shoes of the big young man, the one with the bow.”  
“Gave me a heart attack! I thought he had just killed you and Jason and was going to pick us off next.” Frank said with a shiver.  
“Frank!”  
Sciron shrugged. “If you say so. That was just a demonstration. I’m afraid it could have been much more serious.”  
He spun his flintlocks. The hammers reset, and Hazel had a feeling the guns had just magically reloaded.  
Sciron waggled his eyebrows at Jason. “So! To answer your question—yes, I can attack you and hold your ship hostage at the same time. Celestial bronze ammunition. Quite deadly to demigods. You two would die first—bang, bang. Then I could take my time picking off your friends on that ship. Target practice is so much more fun with live targets running around screaming!”  
“Not really” Percy said wearily. He didn’t really like killing anyone unless they were a monster.  
Jason touched the new furrow that the bullet had plowed through his hair. For once, he didn’t look very confident.  
Hazel’s ankles wobbled. Frank was the best shot she knew with a bow, but this bandit Sciron was inhumanly good.  
“You’re a son of Poseidon?” she managed. “I would’ve thought Apollo, the way you shoot.”  
“Hey, my sons may be good with a bow but they are not bandits!” Apollo said pouting.  
The smile lines deepened around his eyes. “Why, thank you! It’s just from practice, though. The giant turtle—that’s due to my parentage. You can’t go around taming giant turtles without being a son of Poseidon! I could overwhelm your ship with a tidal wave, of course, but it’s terribly difficult work. Not nearly as fun as ambushing and shooting people.”  
“Again, not really.” Percy said.  
Hazel tried to collect her thoughts, stall for time, but it was difficult while staring down the smoking barrels of those flintlocks. “Uh…what’s the bandana for?”  
“So no one recognizes me!” Sciron said.  
“Wow...” was everyones thought at how stupid this guy was.  
“But you introduced yourself,” Jason said. “You’re Sciron.”  
The bandit’s eyes widened. “How did you— Oh. Yes, I suppose I did.” He lowered one flintlock and scratched the side of his head with the other. “Terribly sloppy of me. Sorry. I’m afraid I’m a little rusty. Back from the dead, and all that. Let me try again.”  
He leveled his pistols. “Stand and deliver! I am an anonymous bandit, and you do not need to know my name!”  
An anonymous bandit. Something clicked in Hazel’s memory. “Theseus. He killed you once.”  
“My brothers killing my other brothers, this is just getting better and better.” Percy said sarcastically.  
Sciron’s shoulders slumped. “Now, why did you have to mention him? We were getting along so well!”

Jason frowned. “Hazel, you know this guy’s story?”

She nodded, though the details were murky. “Theseus met him on the road to Athens. Sciron would kill his victims by, um…”

Something about the turtle. Hazel couldn’t remember.

“Theseus was such a cheater!” Sciron complained. “I don’t want to talk about him. I’m back from the dead now. Gaea promised me I could stay on the coastline and rob all the demigods I wanted, and that’s what I’m going to do! Now…where were we?”

“You were about to let us go,” Hazel ventured.

“Nice try but that really never works” Nico said to his sister.

“Hmm…” Sciron said. “No, I’m pretty sure that wasn’t it. Ah, right! Money or your life. Where are your valuables? No valuables? Then I’ll have to—”

“Wait,” Hazel said. “I have our valuables. At least, I can get them.”

Sciron pointed a flintlock at Jason’s head. “Well, then, my dear, hop to it, or my next shot will cut off more than your friend’s hair!”

Hazel hardly needed to concentrate. She was so anxious, the ground rumbled beneath her and immediately yielded a bumper crop—precious metals popping to the surface as though the dirt was anxious to expel them.

She found herself surrounded by a knee-high mound of treasure—Roman denarii, silver drachmas, ancient gold jewelry, glittering diamonds and topaz and rubies—enough to fill several lawn bags.

Sciron laughed with delight. “How in the world did you do that?”

Hazel didn’t answer. She thought about all the coins that had appeared at the crossroads with Hecate. Here were even more—centuries’ worth of hidden wealth from every empire that had ever claimed this land—Greek, Roman, Byzantine, and so many others. Those empires were gone, leaving only a barren coastline for Sciron the bandit.

That thought made her feel small and powerless.

“Again, we have all felt that way at one point.” Frank said to Hazel gently and she cuddled up to him again.

“Just take the treasure,” she said. “Let us go.”

Sciron chuckled. “Oh, but I did say all your valuables. I understand you’re holding something very special on that ship…a certain ivory-and-gold statue about, say, forty feet tall?”

The sweat started to dry on Hazel’s neck, sending a shiver down her back.

Jason stepped forward. Despite the gun pointed at his face, his eyes were as hard as sapphires. “The statue isn’t negotiable.”

“You’re right, it’s not!” Sciron agreed. “I must have it!”

“Gaea told you about it,” Hazel guessed. “She ordered you to take it.”

Sciron shrugged. “Maybe. But she told me I could keep it for myself. Hard to pass up that offer! I don’t intend to die again, my friends. I intend to live a long life as a very wealthy man!”

“The statue won’t do you any good,” Hazel said. “Not if Gaea destroys the world.”

The muzzles of Sciron’s pistols wavered. “Pardon?”

“I’ll never understand that! He was a demigod too at some point, so he should definitely know he is being used. That deal was way too good to be true.” Reyna said seriously.

“Gaea is using you,” Hazel said. “If you take that statue, we won’t be able to defeat her. She’s planning on wiping all mortals and demigods off the face of the earth, letting her giants and monsters take over. So where will you spend your gold, Sciron? Assuming Gaea even lets you live.”

Hazel let that sink in. She figured Sciron would have no trouble believing in double-crosses, being a bandit and all.

He was silent for a count of ten.

Finally his smile lines returned.

“All right!” he said. “I’m not unreasonable. Keep the statue.”

Jason blinked. “We can go?”

“Just one more thing,” Sciron said. “I always demand a show of respect. Before I let my victims leave, I insist that they wash my feet.”

Hazel wasn’t sure she’d heard him right. Then Sciron kicked off his leather boots, one after the other. His bare feet were the most disgusting things Hazel had ever seen…and she had seen some very disgusting things.

They were puffy, wrinkled, and white as dough, as if they’d been soaking in formaldehyde for a few centuries. Tufts of brown hair sprouted from each misshapen toe. His jagged toenails were green and yellow, like a tortoise’s shell.

Then the smell hit her. Hazel didn’t know if her father’s Underworld palace had a cafeteria for zombies, but if it did, that cafeteria would smell like Sciron’s feet.

“That is so gross!” Piper said looking like she might throw up at just the description. “Imagine actually having to see it and smell it in real life. It was awful!” Jason said gagging. 

“So!” Sciron wriggled his disgusting toes. “Who wants the left, and who wants the right?”

“Wait so you actually cleaned his feet?!” Leo said jumping up from his seat next to Jason to get away from him. “You’ll see” was Jason’s only response.

Jason’s face turned almost as white as those feet. “You’ve…got to be kidding.”

“Not at all!” Sciron said. “Wash my feet, and we’re done. I’ll send you back down the cliff. I promise on the River Styx.”

He made that promise so easily, alarm bells rang in Hazel’s mind. Feet. Send you back down the cliff. Tortoise shell.

“Yeah! Hazel to the rescue! You did exactly like Annabeth does!” Percy exclaimed loudly causing both Annabeth and Hazel to blush.

The story came back to her, all the missing pieces fitting into place. She remembered how Sciron killed his victims.

“Could we have a moment?” Hazel asked the bandit.

Sciron’s eyes narrowed. “What for?”

“Well, it’s a big decision,” she said. “Left foot, right foot. We need to discuss.”

She could tell he was smiling under the mask.

“Of course,” he said. “I’m so generous, you can have two minutes.”  
Hazel climbed out of her pile of treasure. She led Jason as far away as she dared—about fifty feet down the cliff, which she hoped was out of earshot.

“Sciron kicks his victims off the cliff,” she whispered.

Jason scowled. “What?”

“When you kneel down to wash his feet,” Hazel said. “That’s how he kills you. When you’re off-balance, woozy from the smell of his feet, he’ll kick you over the edge. You’ll fall right into the mouth of his giant turtle.”

Jason took a moment to digest that, so to speak. He glanced over the cliff, where the turtle’s massive shell glinted just under the water.

“So we have to fight,” Jason said.

“Sciron’s too fast,” Hazel said. “He’ll kill us both.”

“Then I’ll be ready to fly. When he kicks me over, I’ll float halfway down the cliff. Then when he kicks you, I’ll catch you.”

Hazel shook her head. “If he kicks you hard and fast enough, you’ll be too dazed to fly. And even if you can, Sciron’s got the eyes of a marksman. He’ll watch you fall. If you hover, he’ll just shoot you out of the air.”

“Then…” Jason clenched his sword hilt. “I hope you have another idea?”

“Yeah what's the insane plan this time?” Thalia said concerned for her little brother.

A few feet away, Gale the weasel appeared from the bushes. She gnashed her teeth and peered at Hazel as if to say, Well? Do you?

Hazel calmed her nerves, trying to avoid pulling more gold from the ground. She remembered the dream she’d had of her father Pluto’s voice: The dead see what they believe they will see. So do the living. That is the secret.

She understood what she had to do. She hated the idea worse than she hated that farting weasel, worse than she hated Sciron’s feet.

“Unfortunately, yes,” Hazel said. “We have to let Sciron win.”

“What?” Jason demanded.

Hazel told him the plan.

“That's the end of the chapter”  
“What! But I want to know what the plan is” Leo whined.


	31. Hazel XXVIII

“FINALLY!” SCIRON CRIED. “That was much longer than two minutes!”

“Sorry,” Jason said. “It was a big decision…which foot.”

Hazel tried to clear her mind and imagine the scene through Sciron’s eyes—what he desired, what he expected.

That was the key to using the Mist. She couldn’t force someone to see the world her way. She couldn’t make Sciron’s reality appear less believable. But if she showed him what he wanted to see…well, she was a child of Pluto. She’d spent decades with the dead, listening to them yearn for past lives that were only half-remembered, distorted by nostalgia.

“That is terrible. No one should have to spend so long like that!” Frank exclaimed hugging Hazel closer to him.

The dead saw what they believed they would see. So did the living.

Pluto was the god of the Underworld, the god of wealth. Maybe those two spheres of influence were more connected than Hazel had realized. There wasn’t much difference between longing and greed.

If she could summon gold and diamonds, why not summon another kind of treasure—a vision of the world people wanted to see?

Of course she could be wrong, in which case she and Jason were about to be turtle food.

“Wow, so optimistic Hazel.” Nico said bluntly.

She rested her hand on her jacket pocket, where Frank’s magical firewood seemed heavier than usual. She wasn’t just carrying his lifeline now. She was carrying the lives of the entire crew.

Jason stepped forward, his hands open in surrender. “I’ll go first, Sciron. I’ll wash your left foot.”

“Excellent choice!” Sciron wriggled his hairy, corpse-like toes. “I may have stepped on something with that foot. It felt a little squishy inside my boot. But I’m sure you’ll clean it properly.”

“Really gross! I am so glad that this guy, even if he is my half-brother, is dead now.” Percy said with a queasy expression on his face like he might puke.

Jason’s ears reddened. From the tension in his neck, Hazel could tell that he was tempted to drop the charade and attack—one quick slash with his Imperial gold blade. But Hazel knew if he tried, he would fail.

“Sciron,” she broke in, “do you have water? Soap? How are we supposed to wash—”

“Like this!” Sciron spun his left flintlock. Suddenly it became a squirt bottle with a rag. He tossed it to Jason.

Jason squinted at the label. “You want me to wash your feet with glass cleaner?”

“Of course not!” Sciron knit his eyebrows. “It says multi-surface cleanser. My feet definitely qualify as multi-surface. Besides, it’s antibacterial. I need that. Believe me, water won’t do the trick on these babies.”

Sciron wiggled his toes, and more zombie café odor wafted across the cliffs.

Everyone had to stop reading for a minute to gag.

Jason gagged. “Oh, gods, no…”

Sciron shrugged. “You can always choose what’s in my other hand.” He hefted his right flintlock.

“He’ll do it,” Hazel said.

Jason glared at her, but Hazel won the staring contest.

“Does this kind of thing happen a lot, you know making deals with the enemy to spare your lives and stuff?” Lucy asked looking hesitantly at Percy again hoping it was not true. “Unfortunately we have had a lot of experience dealing for our lives.” Percy said sadly looking away from Lucy.

“Fine,” he muttered.

“Excellent! Now…” Sciron hopped to the nearest chunk of limestone that was the right size for a footstool. He faced the water and planted his foot, so he looked like some explorer who’d just claimed a new country. “I’ll watch the horizon while you scrub my bunions. It’ll be much more enjoyable.”

“Yeah,” Jason said. “I bet.”

Jason knelt in front of the bandit, at the edge of the cliff, where he was an easy target. One kick, and he’d topple over.

Hazel concentrated. She imagined she was Sciron, the lord of bandits. She was looking down at a pathetic blond-haired kid who was no threat at all—just another defeated demigod about to become his victim.

In her mind, she saw what would happen. She summoned the Mist, calling it from the depths of the earth the way she did with gold or silver or rubies.

Jason squirted the cleaning fluid. His eyes watered. He wiped Sciron’s big toe with his rag and turned aside to gag. Hazel could barely watch. When the kick happened, she almost missed it.  
“Wait weren’t you supposed to stop Sciron from kicking you off the cliff!” Piper yelled totally confused with what was happening. “You’ll see Pipes, this is all part of the plan.”

Sciron slammed his foot into Jason’s chest. Jason tumbled backward over the edge, his arms flailing, screaming as he fell. When he was about to hit the water, the turtle rose up and swallowed him in one bite, then sank below the surface.

“I don’t understand. If Jason was eaten by this giant turtle, then how is he here right now, alive.” A mortal asked and many more were nodding in agreement. “You will see” was all Jason said.

Alarm bells sounded on the Argo II. Hazel’s friends scrambled on deck, manning the catapults. Hazel heard Piper wailing all the way from the ship.

It was so disturbing, Hazel almost lost her focus. She forced her mind to split into two parts—one intensely focused on her task, one playing the role Sciron needed to see.

She screamed in outrage. “What did you do?”

“Oh, dear…” Sciron sounded sad, but Hazel got the impression he was hiding a grin under his bandana. “That was an accident, I assure you.”

“My friends will kill you now!”

“This is good acting” Reyna said nodding at Hazel in approval causing Hazel to blush.

“They can try,” Sciron said. “But in the meantime, I think you have time to wash my other foot! Believe me, my dear. My turtle is full now. He doesn’t want you too. You’ll be quite safe, unless you refuse.”

He leveled the flintlock pistol at her head.

She hesitated, letting him see her anguish. She couldn’t agree too easily, or he wouldn’t think she was beaten.

“Don’t kick me,” she said, half-sobbing.

His eyes twinkled. This was exactly what he expected. She was broken and helpless. Sciron, the son of Poseidon, had won again.

“Really good acting!” Reyna repeated her earlier statement. “Fortunately acting is just a skill demigods have to pick up if they want to survive.” Thalia said with a sad tone thinking about some of her fallen friends.

Hazel could hardly believe this guy had the same father as Percy Jackson. Then she remembered that Poseidon had a changeable personality, like the sea. Maybe his children reflected that. Percy was a child of Poseidon’s better nature—powerful, but gentle and helpful, the kind of sea that sped ships safely to distant lands. Sciron was a child of Poseidon’s other side—the kind of sea that battered relentlessly at the coastline until it crumbled away, or carried the innocents from shore and let them drown, or smashed ships and killed entire crews without mercy.

“That is actually quite close to the truth” Poseidon said thoughtfully. “Unfortunately I used to be a lot more violent in ancient times so most of my older children reflect that.” 

She snatched up the spray bottle Jason had dropped.

“Sciron,” she growled, “your feet are the least disgusting thing about you.”

His green eyes hardened. “Just clean.”

She knelt, trying to ignore the smell. She shuffled to one side, forcing Sciron to adjust his stance, but she imagined that the sea was still at her back. She held that vision in her mind as she shuffled sideways again.

“Just get on with it!” Sciron said.

Hazel suppressed a smile. She’d managed to turn Sciron one hundred and eighty degrees, but he still saw the water in front of him, the rolling countryside at his back.

“That is so cool!” Leo said eyes shining.

She started to clean.

Hazel had done plenty of ugly work before. She’d cleaned the unicorn stables at Camp Jupiter. She’d filled and dug latrines for the legion.

This is nothing, she told herself. But it was hard not to retch when she looked at Sciron’s toes.

When the kick came, she flew backward, but she didn’t go far. She landed on her butt in the grass a few yards away.

“Yeah! Go Hazel!” Frank cheered causing Hazel to blush from her place under Franks arm.

Sciron stared at her. “But…”

Suddenly the world shifted. The illusion melted, leaving Sciron totally confused. The sea was at his back. He’d only succeeded in kicking Hazel away from the ledge.

He lowered his flintlock. “How—”

“Stand and deliver,” Hazel told him.

Jason swooped out of the sky, right over her head, and body-slammed the bandit over the cliff.

“Oh! I get it now!” Everyone that had been confused before said.  
Sciron screamed as he fell, firing his flintlock wildly, but for once hitting nothing. Hazel got to her feet. She reached the cliff’s edge in time to see the turtle lunge and snap Sciron out of the air.

“That is seriously cool!” Leo said eyes still shining like he just finished a new invention.

Jason grinned. “Hazel, that was amazing. Seriously…Hazel? Hey, Hazel?”

Hazel collapsed to her knees, suddenly dizzy.

“Oh great, I forgot about this part.” Hazel grumbled. All the demigods look over at her worriedly but she just waved them off.

Distantly, she could hear her friends cheering from the ship below. Jason stood over her, but he was moving in slow motion, his outline blurry, his voice nothing but static.

Frost crept across the rocks and grass around her. The mound of riches she’d summoned sank back into the earth. The Mist swirled.

What have I done? she thought in a panic. Something went wrong.

“No, Hazel,” said a deep voice behind her. “You have done well.”

She hardly dared to breathe. She’d only heard that voice once before, but she had replayed it in her mind thousands of times.

She turned and found herself looking up at her father.

“Wait Hades or Pluto?! He actually visited you!?” Nico said with a panicked look on his face thinking his sister had been close to death. “Nico, I know what you are thinking. No she was not close to death, she was fine.” Hades reassured Nico.

He was dressed in Roman style—his dark hair close-cropped, his pale, angular face clean-shaven. His tunic and toga were of black wool, embroidered with threads of gold. The faces of tormented souls shifted in the fabric. The edge of his toga was lined with the crimson of a senator or a praetor, but the stripe rippled like a river of blood. On Pluto’s ring finger was a massive opal, like a chunk of polished frozen Mist.

“Then that is definitely Pluto.” Nico said still slightly worried since godly parents don’t just visit for no reason.

His wedding ring, Hazel thought. But Pluto had never married Hazel’s mother. Gods did not marry mortals. That ring would signify his marriage to Persephone.

The thought made Hazel so angry, she shook off her dizziness and stood.

“What do you want?” she demanded.

She hoped her tone would hurt him—jab him for all the pain he’d caused her. But a faint smile played across his mouth.

Hades shifted to his roman form and looked at Hazel sadly.

“My daughter,” he said. “I am impressed. You have grown strong.”

No thanks to you, she wanted to say. She didn’t want to take any pleasure in his compliment, but her eyes still prickled.

“I thought you major gods were incapacitated,” she managed. “Your Greek and Roman personalities fighting against one another.”

“We are,” Pluto agreed. “But you invoked me so strongly that you allowed me to appear…if only for a moment.”

“I didn’t invoke you.”

“That's what you think” Pluto said with a small smile.

But even as she said it, she knew it wasn’t true. For the first time, willingly, she’d embraced her lineage as a child of Pluto. She’d tried to understand her father’s powers and use them to the fullest.

“When you come to my house in Epirus,” Pluto said, “you must be prepared. The dead will not welcome you. And the sorceress Pasiphaë—”

“Hey you knew too!” Leo said accusingly at Hazel. Hazel just nodded before saying “I didn’t want to worry you guys since it was my fight.”

“Pacify?” Hazel asked. Then she realized that must be the woman’s name.

“She will not be fooled as easily as Sciron.” Pluto’s eyes glittered like volcanic stone. “You succeeded in your first test, but Pasiphaë intends to rebuild her domain, which will endanger all demigods. Unless you stop her at the House of Hades…”

All the demigods who had been into the Labyrinth shivered at the thought.

His form flickered. For a moment he was bearded, in Greek robes with a golden laurel wreath in his hair. Around his feet, skeletal hands broke through the earth.

The god gritted his teeth and scowled.

His Roman form stabilized. The skeletal hands dissolved back into the earth.

“We do not have much time.” He looked like a man who’d just been violently ill. “Know that the Doors of Death are at the lowest level of the Necromanteion. You must make Pasiphaë see what she wants to see. You are right. That is the secret to all magic. But it will not be easy when you are in her maze.”

“What do you mean? What maze?”

“The Labyrinth is evil and definitely alive. It is a maze that has a mind of its own and will drive you insane.” Annabeth said darkly remembering her friend Chris Roderigez who had gone insane.

“You will understand,” he promised. “And, Hazel Levesque…you will not believe me, but I am proud of your strength. Sometimes…sometimes the only way I can care for my children is to keep my distance.”

Hazel bit back an insult. Pluto was just another deadbeat godly dad making weak excuses. But her heart pounded as she replayed his words: I am proud of your strength.

“Go to your friends,” Pluto said. “They will be worried. The journey to Epirus still holds many perils.”

“Wait,” Hazel said.

Pluto raised an eyebrow.

“When I met Thanatos,” she said, “you know…Death…he told me I wasn’t on your list of rogue spirits to capture. He said maybe that’s why you were keeping your distance. If you acknowledged me, you’d have to take me back to the Underworld.”

Pluto waited. “What is your question?”

“You’re here. Why don’t you take me to the Underworld? Return me to the dead?”

“Why would you ask that!?” everyone yelled at her.

Pluto’s form started to fade. He smiled, but Hazel couldn’t tell if he was sad or pleased. “Perhaps that is not what I want to see, Hazel. Perhaps I was never here.”

“That's the end of the chapter”


	32. A/N Not a Hiatus

Hey everyone!

I am so sorry I have not updated in so long. At first it was getting prepared for school finals and after finals were over I got a job at a over night summer camp, I also being the clumsy person I am messed up my wrist doing something. Unfortunately that has left me no time to write until now. Expect an update by Saturday when I will once again be gone until the end of summer. I am sorry for the excuses that I know you all hate hearing. Just know I have no plans of abandoning or discontinuing this story. It has helped me improve my writing and grammar, all of your corrections and input has been so helpful. Thank you all for understanding.

-Mythology_geek02


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